Genesis 1:1

One of the things that happened before God created the heavens and the earth, is that God made a plan: a great eternal plan. God’s plan included every person to whom He would give life. God’s plan included the plan of salvation whereby Jesus the Son of God would come to the earth and die for the sins of the world. God has a plan for your life, but you can only enter into that plan if you surrender your will to His will and choose to believe in Jesus.

The Bible says in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” I hope you enjoy reading these words. These are the first words of the Bible. They are very important words because they are the first written words that God gave to man. It says in Second Timothy 3:16, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” They were written almost 3,500 years ago by Moses as he was moved by the Holy Spirit. They are true words. “Thy Word is truth.”

Genesis 1:1 starts out by saying, “In the beginning.” What beginning is spoken of here? The beginning of the heavens and the earth: in other words all of the universe. If we go back as far as we can go to the beginning, we will get to the point where the universe came into existence. How long ago was that? We do not know from a Biblical standpoint. We only know that from a Biblical standpoint whenever it was, that this is what happened: “God created the heavens and the earth.” God was already there when the beginning began, because God has no beginning. Only God has no beginning. That is one of the reasons that we say that Jesus is God. Jesus has no beginning. Jesus existed before He came to the earth as a man. Jesus is quoted in Revelation 1:8 where he says, “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.” Speaking of the high priest Melchisedec and comparing him to Jesus Christ, the Bible says in Hebrews 7:3 “Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life: but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually.”

When we read that “God created the heavens and the earth,” we know the Bible is speaking of the trinity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. All three were present and all participated in creation. In Genesis 1:22 God speaks of Himself in the plural and says, “Let us make man in our image.” Genesis 1:2 speaks of the Holy Spirit and says, “And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” The Bible puts Jesus at the creation event in John 1:1-3 that says, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him and without Him was not anything made that was made.”

Notice the phrase “in the beginning” that is used in John 1:1 and John 1:2. Of course, it is the same phrase that the book of Genesis starts with. The book of Genesis is the book of beginnings. It is a very good book to study to make sure that you have the right foundation for many important teachings. In the book of Genesis we have the first teachings about the relationship between God and man, and between man and woman. We have the origin of sin and death. We have the first promise of the Messiah, and the first covenant. We also have the beginnings of the Jews and the Arabs. If you know the book of Genesis, you will know many things that God wants you to know about the world around you, and you will be prepared to study the rest of the Bible.

The Bible says in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” This is a great foundational truth. In the doctrine of the origin of life, you must begin with this teaching or else you are dealing with falsehood. Anyone who starts with the wrong foundation will end up with the wrong conclusions. That is one reason that the Theory of Evolution has gone so far astray from what the real situation is. They started with wrong ideas and they ended with a wrong theory, and their ideas are very far away from what really happened. In one small area, the adaptation of the species, the evolutionists are simply observing what we can all observe in the world around us: that life adapts to environmental changes. I can look at my pet Bichon Frise and see evidence of the adaptation of the species. But as far as the origin of life is concerned the evolutionists are dead wrong because they did not include Genesis chapters 1-3 as part of their thought process. They did not believe Genesis 1:1 nor did they use the word of God as their foundation. They started with wrong ideas, and therefore they ended wrong.

Concerning the doctrine of the origin of life, the only things that we know for sure are the things that are written in the Bible, and the things that can be proved beyond any doubt. The Theory of Evolution is a “theory.” Is is not even a scientific theory. It is a philosophical theory. But we must be careful in studying the Bible. Only the verses of the Bible are true. All explanations of those verses, even this one, can contain a certain amount of personal opinion and interpretation. Just because we believe the Biblical account of creation, does not mean that we accept every point presented by a particular Creationist. Evolutionists are biased, but some creationists are biased also. Be careful. The Bible and only the Bible is God’s Word.

It says in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created…” God created. God worked, and after He worked, He rested. Because man was created in the image of God, man should also create in his own way: man should work. One of the great purposes of life is to work and to accomplish something. Jesus said of His own life in John 9:4, “I must work the works of Him that sent me while it is day. The night cometh when no man can work.”

The first law of Thermodynamics says that energy can be neither created nor destroyed: it can only change forms. This “law” comes from observing and understanding the world around us. In other words, it comes from science. We can take this idea a little bit further and say that life itself cannot be created. Life comes from life. That fact is scientific truth. Life never comes from non-life. Louis Pasteur proved that life cannot be spontaneously generated. And yet the Theory of Evolution goes against observable science and claims that life was generated from non-life. The Bible is more scientific. It gives a plausible explanation for the origin of life: “In the beginning God created.”

The Bible says in Genesis 1:2, “And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” To say that the earth was “without form and void” means, that the earth was a wasteland and was empty. And so we see that when God first created the earth there was no life on the earth. The earth was a wasteland and was barren of any form of life. In other words, the earth was like all the other planets.

There are a few things that the Bible tells us, but there are many things that are not revealed by the Bible and that are open to speculation. For example, the Bible does not tell us how long ago all of this started. It says, “In the beginning,” but it does not tell us how many years ago the beginning began. The same thing is true concerning the earth existing without form and void. We know that the earth existed in that way for a time, but we do not know for how long a time the earth was in such a state.

Genesis 1:2 tells us that when the earth was in this state of being “without form and void” that water was already on the earth. It speaks of the “deep” and of “waters.” We have initially an earth that is a wasteland. There is water, but there is no life: not yet. And then something happens. Something changes. God does something. Genesis 1:2 says, “And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”

Genesis 1:3 says, “And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.” We know that God created all things. This means that He created light as well. The light for the earth comes from the sun. Perhaps Genesis 1:3 is telling us, the time that the earth was hurled into its orbit with the sun, or in some other way the earth came into its current relationship with the sun. Until the earth came into its present orbit, it would have been traveling through the darkness of space. And perhaps there was darkness on the earth for some other reason.

Concerning light and darkness, the Bible says in Genesis 1:4, “And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.” One of the things that we see from this verse is that there was a purpose to everything that God created. Before the physical and material world was created, the spiritual world already existed. The physical and material world is a reflection of the spiritual world. There are spiritual lessons to learn from observing the material world. There is a lesson in understanding the difference between light and darkness. “God saw the light, that it was good.” From a spiritual standpoint Jesus is the light of the world. It says about Jesus in John 1:4-5, “In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.” Human beings will choose either darkness or light. God saw the light that it was good. How wicked people are when they turn away from the Light, which is Christ. Jesus said in John 3:20-21, “For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.”

The Bible says in Genesis 1:5, “And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.” This appearance of light on the earth could have come in many ways. Perhaps it was the initial creation of light. Perhaps light was created back in verse 1, and this particular appearance of light on the earth came by God causing the earth to enter the solar system initially. Perhaps it came by God removing some thick cloud cover or some other phenomenon that had the sunlight blocked from reaching the earth. One thing that Genesis 1:5 does tell us is that the seven days mentioned in Genesis chapter one are definitely 24-hour periods of time. Once you have “evening and morning” and “Day” and “Night” you are talking about a 24-hour period. This 24-hour period of day and night only takes place when the earth rotates on its axis in its orbit around the sun. Until the earth came into its orbit around the sun, the 24-hour period of day and night did not and could not exist. These six days of creation are another major point where the Bible is in great contrast to the Theory of Evolution. The Bible speaks of instantaneous creation: one day there was no life on the earth, and the very next day life appeared because of the creative act of God.

The Bible says in Genesis 1:6-8, “And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.” When the Bible speaks of “heaven,” there are three different things that it is sometimes talking about, depending upon the context. The first use of “heaven” refers to the earth’s atmosphere. The second use of the word heaven is relating to space (the realm of the moon and the stars). And of course, “heaven” is used to refer to the heavenly abode of God, of the angels, and of the souls of people who are saved. The use of the word “heaven” in Genesis 1:7 appears to be talking about the earth’s atmosphere. Of course, there was a great deal of water upon the earth already as is mentioned in Genesis 1:2. Evidently God also placed a great deal of water above the earth perhaps in the form of water vapor. This water that was above the earth might have been the source of all the rain that caused the great flood in the days of Noah.

Concerning the third day of creation, the Bible says in Genesis 1:9-10, “And God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. And God called the dry land earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he seas: and God saw that it was good.” Every detail of earth’s existence was planned by God. For example, the very fact that there are oceans and land masses was God’s design. He brought it into being on the third day of creation. Another big difference between the Theory of evolution and Creation is the fact that the Theory of evolution relies on the ability of pure chance to bring order out of chaos. But order out of chaos does not happen and cannot happen with an intelligent guiding force. You cannot have a watch without a watchmaker. God’s intelligence designed the order and precision of the world and of the universe in which the world exists. God has also designed the plan of salvation through faith in Christ. In the fullness of time, God sent forth His Son to be born of a virgin and to die for the sins of the world. Now is your time to believe on Jesus, if you have not yet done so. Call upon His name and find forgiveness of sins.

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