From Nothing

In this discourse, I want to discuss the difference between the creation of the universe and what I am going to call ... recreation. Most likely, "recreation" isn't the correct word for how God brought the things into being in the third verse of Genesis, but that's the term I am going to use.

The original creation. Genesis 1:1 … "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."

"In the beginning" ... Before the creative acts mentioned in this chapter, all was eternity past. There was no time. Time is a measurement of duration, so before the "beginning" it was just the eternal past. "In the beginning" then must necessarily mean the commencement of time which followed, or rather as produced by God’s creative acts.

The first word to look at is ... beginning ... and in Hebrew it is ray-sheeth' and means … the first (in place, time, order or rank.)

Now right away we come to a difficulty. Is this first creation … in the beginning … speaking of our universe, or is it speaking of God's realm, where He dwells with the angels, where the plan of the ages was thought out; in other words … the spiritual realm where His throne is.

As a child I used to make my mother scratch her head for answers when I would ask her questions like … "Where was God before He created the first anything? Before He had a throne in Heaven, was God just floating around in the nothingness of the absence of even space? Better yet, what was He doing?" All of these questions came to mind as I was developing my understanding of an eternal God.

I do not feel the need to address my childhood questions today … I'll leave that for another day. Today I am using the assumption that the creation spoken of by Moses in verse 1, deals with us, our realm, our universe and our earth since the commencement of keeping time begins there.

The second word to look at is … created … the word in Hebrew is bara, pronounced baw-raw' … which means (to bring into existence from nothing.) Notice in verse 1 that Moses just states that God brings the heavens and the earth into existence, he doesn't say how. A lot is said in the Bible about speaking, whether it's God or us. But here God is not shown as saying anything. The heavens (the universe) and planet earth just come into being as God wills it so.

Genesis 1:2 … "And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep."

Chaos … this is not how God originally created it.

"The earth was without form, and void …" The word void in Hebrew is ... bo hu … pronounced bo'-hoo … and means, (an undistinguishable ruin, emptiness, void.)

Where verse 1 tells of the original creation … verse 2 is speaking of the earth in a fallen state of chaos, cold, dark and lifeless. But it won't stay that way much longer. God is getting ready for it's recreation.

So what happened to cause the earth to fall into the state of chaos that it was in.

In the dateless past, millions of years ago, the first earth was made for Lucifer, (the anointed cherub) one of only three named angels. When he tried to overthrow God, he was cast back down to the earth, which I believe was the main reason for the earth being in this state of chaos.

Jeremiah 4:23-26 … "I beheld the earth, it was without form, and void; and the heavens had no light."
Ezekiel 28:14-17 … "Thou art the anointed cherub, thou was perfect til … thou hast sinned … thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, I will cast thee down to the ground."
Isaiah 14:12-14 ... "How art thou fallen O Lucifer, how art thou cut down to the ground, which did weaken the nations."

What nations? (The word nation here means … a massing of people.)

The New Testament also speaks about this period of time some call, the pre-Adamite world found in 2nd Peter 3:5-7, "… the heavens of old, and the earth standing out of the water … the world that then was, being overflowed with water perished, but the heavens and the earth, which are now …"

Some people say "the world that then was" is talking about Noah’s flood, but I don’t think so. Notice it says "the heavens of old," and continues with "but the heavens which are now." If this were talking about Noah’s flood, it wouldn’t say that the heavens perished. Only the earth’s surface temporarily perished, not the heavens above.

The facts as I see them. In verse 1, God created the heavens and the earth out of nothing. Then we have an unknown period of time until the fall of Lucifer, (when he tried to overthrow God) which caused the earth to fall into a state of chaos … from God's judgment. Again, an unknown period of time passes between verse 1 and verse 2 … until God decides to recreate the earth, starting in verse 3. Here God either speaks things back into existence, or makes them out of existing material.

And then in verse 3 we find these words … "And God said ..."

Now we have God speaking things back into existence from the chaos, the ruin it was in. He calls for light and then divides it into night and day. He calls for the atmosphere ... the firmament … which is the visible expanse of sky.

Continue on to verse 7, Moses writes ... "And God made …" which is showing that something is different than when he said God created our universe in the beginning.

The third word to examine is ... made ... the Hebrew is asah, pronounced aw-saw' … which means, to make out of existing material.

In verse 1, God created (bara) the heavens and the earth out of nothing … but here in verse 7, God made (asah) things out of stuff (existing material) He had previously created in verse 1. He just speaks them back into existence … out of the chaos … like the dry land, the grass and fruit trees, etc.

Notice in verse 26, when God said … "Let us make man" … Moses uses the word asah, (to make out of existing material.) Which is what He did. God takes red clay and makes ... "dirt man" and names him Adam, (pronounced aw-dam') because he is ruddy colored.

In the next verse, Moses switches back to the word bara, (to bring into existence from nothing.) God (asah) made, (or formed) man from existing material … but (bara) created man as something (which never was before) when He breathed His breath into Adam and he became a living soul.

God can and has created things from nothing … that's bara.

I sometimes feel that He has done that with me. But I guess, what He really did was take the empty clay vessel of my life, place it on the potters wheel, add some living water to it to soften it up and then remake it into something He could use … that's asah.



Comments welcome.