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Lectionary B ~ OT 25 September 20, 2015 THE STORY SERIES ‘In the Beginning’ Genesis 1 – 4; 6-­‐9 The Story Chapter 1 “In the Beginning” God’s plans to enjoy our company in a perfect garden were soon upset by our wrong choices. …………………….…………read Genesis 1:1-­‐31; Genesis 2:7 (selected verses)……………………………… “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deed, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters…” (and God spoke and the sky was created and the waters separated from dry land. God spoke and the planets and stars were formed. God spoke again and living things filled the seas and the land, and then God spoke the crowning touch) 26 “And God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground. Genesis 2:7 “the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” Genesis 1:31 “And God blessed them...and saw that it was very good.” ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. Most of us are familiar with the first lines of the Bible, ‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth…’ We remember that in the beginning God formed the universe out of nothing. The sky, the water, the land, everything that lives, including us, was made by God. I just read recently that there are 100,000,000 (100 billion) galaxies that have been discovered in the last twenty years or so.1 Big patches of solar systems have been found by the Hubble Space telescope in the deep dark space next to the Big Dipper and Orion. The thought that there could be other ‘earths’ way out there is absolutely mind-­‐boggling. If ever we are tempted to think that we are the center of the universe, we definitely have to think again! Realizing all this makes Genesis all the more fascinating, don’t you think? We just have to stop and ask ‘why?’ Why did God take the time to make a planet for us to live on and a solar system arranged ‘just so’ to perfectly sustain our life… He gave us just the right amount of sun, shade, plants, animals and air to breathe. Why? The biggest question to ask perhaps is, ‘Why did God take the time to make us?’ The answer is right here in Genesis. God put all that effort into creating the world and us because God wanted to share life with us. Turning further in Genesis to Chapter 2 verse 8 (2:8), (page 2 of your pew Bible and page 3 of The Story) we read about the perfect garden that God created so that humans and God could have a paradise in which to enjoy each other’s company forever. God ‘walked’ with them and talked with them often in the Garden. (Genesis 3:8) 1
Randy Frazee, The Heart of the Story, (Zondervan: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2011), 25. Hebron Presbyterian Church Rev. Cinda Isler 1 Lectionary B ~ OT 25 September 20, 2015 THE STORY SERIES ‘In the Beginning’ Genesis 1 – 4; 6-­‐9 The Story Chapter 1 In ‘Eden’ the garden was truly like its name suggested; which in Hebrew, means ‘delight.’ Interesting, isn’t it, to think that Eden was likely planted in the vicinity of Iran, Turkey and Armenia where there is so much turmoil going on today? In God’s plan, humans would be the caretakers of all the other creatures and the land and seas that God had made. Adam and Eve and their descendants would be God’s vice-­‐rulers over the entire earth. God didn’t force Adam and Eve to love Him. He gave them the choice to choose to live by His rules. And it didn’t take long for them to ‘choose poorly.’ There were two important trees planted in the Garden. The fruit of the Tree of Life gave eternal life and the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil brought death. It sounds confusing to us that eating the fruit of ‘knowledge’ would be a bad thing. That the simple act of eating fruit would bring such a harsh punishment doesn’t make much sense. But eating from the ‘Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil’ meant more than gaining wisdom. By eating this fruit, Adam and Eve decided that they didn’t want to obey what God told them was ‘good or evil.’ They wanted to decide that for themselves. Hmmm…. it does sound familiar, doesn’t it? Well, they did it. They ate the one fruit that they weren’t supposed to eat. And the consequences were disastrous. Not only were Adam and Eve expelled from the Garden but they were denied access to the Tree of Life. Death, sickness, and sorrow entered into their lives. God’s good plan for humankind was veering off track! This entire week I’ve been hearing over and over in my head a line from the song about Woodstock by Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young…. “Well I came across a child of God, He was walking along the road, and I asked him tell where are you going… Goin' to get back to the land to set my soul free;… We are stardust, we are golden, We are 2 billion year old carbon, And we got to get ourselves….back to the garden.”2 I don’t think the man found Eden at Woodstock! But I do know that we all need to get back to the Garden. And that’s what The Story is all about. The God that Genesis tells us about wasn’t like the other gods people worshipped at that time. The gods of other nations were malicious and didn’t care at all about the earth or humans. Those other gods certainly weren’t interested in enjoying the company of humans; they had no intention of demeaning themselves to come down to earth. Their gods only created humans so that the humans could work for them. They were only valuable for the food that they could grow to feed the gods. Very differently, the God of Genesis provided the food Himself for the humans He made. God said, “I give you every seed-­‐
bearing plant on the face of the whole earth… They will be yours for food.” (Genesis 1:29) The God of Genesis created everything out of nothing. Every thing. The gods in the other creation stories didn’t create from nothing, they just rearranged what was there already 2
http://www.lyrics007.com/Crosby%20Lyrics/Woodstock%20Lyrics.html Hebron Presbyterian Church Rev. Cinda Isler 2 Lectionary B ~ OT 25 September 20, 2015 THE STORY SERIES ‘In the Beginning’ Genesis 1 – 4; 6-­‐9 The Story Chapter 1 and struggled, using magic to create. It wasn’t difficult for the God of Genesis to make the world; He just ‘spoke.’ Other nations thought that the planets and the stars were gods. They also worshipped the giant sea u as gods. But Genesis proved their claims false. The stars, the sun and moon, and every living creature were created and ruled by The True God. They were not gods at all! No, the God of Genesis is different, and blessedly so. After Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden, evil multiplied. Their son Cain killed his brother Abel. Evil increased until the day when God decided that His plan needed a new start. God found one righteous man to make a new beginning. God tapped a good and Godly man named Noah to try to bring His people back to the Garden. Noah built the Ark just the way that God told him to. He took his three sons, their wives, and his wife into the Ark to make a new start. God had hoped that the Flood would destroy all the traces of sin and disobedience so that He could live together again with His humans. But it didn’t work. The sin traces were still there. Even righteous Noah became drunk after he set foot on dry land. Immediately, his son Ham transgressed moral boundaries. Evil once again polluted the human race and tainted even God’s creation that they were supposed to supervise. Understanding God’s purpose for us in Genesis makes all the difference in how we live in this world. If all of our laws reflected God’s original intent for us, how would our lives be different? In my community we are killing the deer because they are eating our tulips. If our commission realized that we are God’s ‘ambassadors’ over all that He created, would they have found a less drastic way to co-­‐exist with the deer? I’m sure that you’ve seen the news out of Europe about the hundreds of thousands of men, women and children in Syria and Iraq fleeing for their lives from the horrific persecution in their countries. What if their leaders took Genesis seriously and thought of God instead of themselves? Amazingly, despite our appalling behavior, God hasn’t given up on us. God continues to find a way for us to walk and talk with Him. And that is what we will find as we continue to read His Story for the next 30 weeks. Join us next week, and read ahead in the story of Abraham, (Chapter 2 of The Story, or Genesis 12 – 35) to see what new plan God will try next to bring His people back together with Him. What I hope you will see in the story of Genesis from today is that even though we have been kicked out of the Garden, we are precious and loved by God. God continues to provide a way for us to be reunited with Him. Hebron Presbyterian Church Rev. Cinda Isler 3 Lectionary B ~ OT 25 September 20, 2015 THE STORY SERIES ‘In the Beginning’ Genesis 1 – 4; 6-­‐9 The Story Chapter 1 Until the Day when God’s Story will come to a close, God has given us His Son Jesus, who gave himself to us as our Tree of Life. Jesus gives us the food of eternal life through the forgiveness for our sin. Trusting in him, even though we will die, we have his promise that joined to him, we also will live. Let us pray: Great and marvelous God we celebrate that You have made us and that You have not abandoned us to our own misguided behavior. Thank you for Your Story so that we can know and appreciate all that you have done for us and are doing for us. Help us never to forget and to forever be thankful that You love us and have made a way for us to join You again in Your Delightful Garden. Amen. Hebron Presbyterian Church Rev. Cinda Isler 4