Question 13: What is the work of
creation?
The work of creation is God’s making all things of nothing, by the word of His power and all very good.
DAY 1: Genesis 1:1, 31
In the previous question we discussed that God executes His decrees in the works of creation and providence. Over the next weeks we will look at what is meant by “the works of creation” and “God’s works of providence”. For now, let’s focus on God’s works of creation. What are they?
Let’s begin in the beginning. Genesis 1:1 tells us that God was in the beginning. Therefore, God must have been around in the beginning. Before there was a created thing, whether physical or spiritual, there was God. Only the persons of the Trinity existed in all their glory. God was content in Himself. He was and still is self-sufficient. He had no need, in terms of sustaining Himself, for creating anything. However, that did not stop Him from creating things.
He had a plan from all eternity to bring glory to Himself through the creation, and so, He began to speak. In Genesis 1 we see the results of God speaking. He speaks and there is light (vs. 3). He speaks and the firmament is created, to divide the waters around the earth from those on the earth (vs. 6). He speaks and the waters of the earth gather together and the dry land appears (vs. 9). He speaks and the earth brings forth grass, herbs (plants), and fruit trees (vs. 11). He speaks and the moon, sun, and stars along with the planets came into existence (vs. 14). He speaks and the creatures of the water come forth along with the birds of the air (vs. 20). He speaks and all kinds of beasts and livestock along with every creeping thing come into existence (vs. 24).
Finally, God made man. He did not speak man into existence like the other things in His creation. Rather, Genesis 2:7 tells us that God “formed” man from the dust, or more appropriately the red clay and water, of the earth. The word formed (yatsar) means, “to fashion, to form, to frame”. The picture indicated by the word would be found in the book of Jeremiah in the famous passage about the Potter’s house (Jer. 18). God took His time in creating man and gave him the breath of life and created him in His image. Man was different from the animals. He was able to reason and discourse with God. Thus man became the crown jewel of the creation. Then God, after setting up the “stage”, so to speak, stood back and declared that it was very good (vs. 31).
As
we looked at last time, God’s design for His creation is for it to glorify
Him. Whether it’s the heavens (Psalm
19:1; 97:6), or man (1 Cor.
DAY 2: Hebrews 11:3
The
opening to the eleventh chapter of Hebrews begins by telling us what faith
is. “Now faith is the substance of
things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Pistis
is the Greek word for faith and means, “conviction of the truth of anything,
belief”. In the New Testament, it
references a conviction or belief respecting man's relationship to God and
divine things. In this particular
chapter we are introduced to many examples of those who had faith. This is not some general faith that people
speak of today. Our children must
understand the way the world views faith and the way the Bible speaks of
faith. Our society speaks of different
“faiths” when it refers to religious organizations. We speak of faith in the context of what
Scripture says about it (cf. Eph. 2:9;
The writer of Hebrews says that it is by faith that we understand, or perceive, that the worlds were framed by the word of God. The writer uses the word aion for worlds. We get our word eon for this. It is not a reference to material worlds. Rather it references the ages or times. God put in place time before He created any physical thing (Gen. 1:1). We often think of our dwelling as three dimensional, but we also have a fourth dimension we operate in, and that is time. The writer goes on to say that the ages were framed. He uses the Greek verb katartizo, which carries the idea of “being fitted together, made complete, or rendered”. He made time so that it would be stable and so that the creation He would form would be able to exist within the frame of time. Some scientists say the universe should have imploded almost as soon as it came into being, but here we are privileged to have faith to believe that God supernaturally held it together.
The writer also emphasizes that the ages were framed “by the word of God”. His reference is not to Jesus Christ, though it is through Him that all things were created. Jesus is referred to as the logos, or the Word. However, the word used here, for word, is rhema. Rhema simply means, “speech, spoken words”. Obviously this is a reference to the things discussed previously. That God simply spoke and it was. He did not have to use all kinds of created things to bring about time. He simply spoke, and it was.
Lastly, the author denies the eternal existence of matter and the material world. This is crucial to the view that the universe was created out of nothing. He says that the things which are seen did not come from the things which appear. It could be best translated, “so that not out of things which appear hath that which is seen been made”. He simply states that God did not use materials in His creation, but brought everything about out of nothing. And since you and I weren’t around at the time, we believe these things by faith. And, contrary to popular opinion, evolutionists accept their view by faith as well, because they weren’t around then either. We accept God’s word on the subject and as we are learning, science continues to prove what the Bible has said all along, that God made everything out of nothing. Do we stand in awe of the God of creation? Does thinking on these things make us aware of His divine power and His Godhead? They should.
DAY 3: Exodus 20:11
Was the universe created in just six days? Many have debated whether or not there were six literal days or whether the days were really much longer in the beginning, like thousands of years were equal to a day. However, over and over, we see that the reference is made to God creating the world in six literal days. Our seven day weeks are based on the example of God’s creation.
Moses
included the reaffirmation of God creating all things in six days in the fourth
commandment. He told
He
says that
Again, the appeal to the number of days is given to men to help them understand who they are dealing with. They are dealing with a being who is capable of making all the things around them, i.e. the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them, in just six days. In my home it has taken me, in the total time I’ve been working on it, several weeks just to try and complete my upstairs. Or, what about the bookcase in my living room that I've been trying to finish for weeks? Let’s not even go there. The point is that when you and I make something, we first of all must have something in order to make something else. We do not possess the power to create out of nothing. God simply spoke and there was the creation and He spoke and it became orderly. The simple results of God speaking continue to baffle unbelievers and continue to inspire reverence for unbelievers.
The creation then, becomes a display of the glory and majesty and power of the God behind it. It is through the creation that God will execute His decrees and make manifest His purposes and plans.
DAY 4: Romans 4:17
The context of this verse is Paul’s affirmation that saving faith is apart from any human works. He labors the point by using Abraham as an example and asks when was Abraham declared righteous? Was it before circumcision, or after? He tells us it was while he was uncircumcised (vs. 10). Verse thirteen tells us that Abraham had heirs that would also receive the promise, not by law, but by the righteousness of faith.
In coming to verse seventeen, Paul writes that God made Abraham not only a father to Isaac, but a father of many nations. God did not promise this somewhere in secret, but Abraham was in God’s presence when the promise was given.
God is then reference as having power to “gives life to the dead” and “calls those things which do not exist as though they did”. The first attribute could be said of the womb of Sarah. It was barren and “dead”. But God quickened it and it gave birth to a son. The same could be said of Abraham. Though he was old, he was given the ability to produce a child. The term could be used to speak of the regeneration of men from their deadness in sin to becoming a new creation in Christ. We could also say that it is God and God alone who is able to call forth the dead on the last day and make them alive to stand judgment. He is the only One who has this power.
As for the second attribute, we could apply the same thinking there as well. For instance, God called Abraham a father of many nations, before he was even a father of a son. He called the Gentiles His seed and offspring before they were as well. He has said in Scripture that we are predestined to an inheritance and to salvation and to holy living even before we were born. But more than likely it is a reference back to creation. The fact that God has shown Himself faithful in the creating all things from nothing is evidence that the things we can’t see inside of us, those which are spiritual, such as justification and sanctification, can be believed in light of the word of God. And just as there is evidence of what God said happened about 6,000 years ago, there will also be evidence of what He says happened in our hearts when He gave life to the dead.
Creation
then becomes a picture of the plan of God.
When God made the creation, He said it was very good. But then the creation degenerated through sin
and so did man. Then man was able to be regenerated
by God, and so one day, the creation will be as well (Rom.