Genesis 1 v 14 - 31 - Days 3 - 6

Genesis 1 v 3 - 10 - Days 1 -3

v3 - 5 And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning - the first day.

God said, and things happened. It just amazes me sometimes, the great power that God has. His command makes things reality! 

The first things he wants, is for light, but it's not the sun, the sun doesn't come into it til a little later. I don't really know about this light, or what it does or how it is light. God sees this light as good, God's pretty good himself, so whatever he creates is probably going to be good as well. When God creates light, he doesn't eliminate darkness though, he just makes them so they exist together but separately in the form of day and night. 

"Days". Is this 24 hours? God's days? Who knows, doesn't really matter either! But, there is a distinction between verses 1&2 and then verses 3-5. The earth has been around a lot longer than species have, so it is likely that there is a time lapse between the first set of verses, but we don't really know, timings are very different.

v6 -8 And God said: "Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water." So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. God called the vault "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning - the second day. 

God said, and God did. Not just saying it like in verse 4 & 5 but today he said what he wanted and then he made it. Pretty cool huh.  He separated water on earth, with the water in heaven, which apparently are clouds? Anyway, day 2!

v9 -10 And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so. God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good.

So in verse 2 there's just some mass of water, and here God organizes the chaos a little but making it into land and water, and making it useful for us. And there's this whole idea of "Pangaea" that like the land was all in one place, and we've all separated away from it in the different continents. But regardless, the water in the sea all flows together, it's not separate. But yeah, pretty simple, God starts making the earth ready for us!

Genesis 1 v 1 - 2 - The beginning

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters." Genesis 1 v 1- 2 (NIV)

Everything begins and ends with God - he's eternal. It's a hugely hard concept for us to grasp, something that's without time and an even harder concept for non Christians. But he has existed always, but the heavens and the earth have not existed forever, and they definitely won't last forever. 

God created. These two words contradict a lot of what the world thinks. Firstly, it disproves atheism, because there's a God. It disproves Polytheism as there is only one God, not many. It disproves Pantheism which says God and the universe are the same. And more importantly, it disproves scientific theories that the origins of the universe happened by chance. 

We aren't told how the earth was actually created but really - does it matter? People can spend their lives proving / disproving "the big bang theory" but in reality, does it matter? Us as Christians KNOW that God created the world, we don't need to fuss about how he did it. 

At first, the Earth was uninhabitable, there was nothing there. There seems to be a running theme in commentaries that this was seen as chaos. The Spirit of God - the same we know - hovers over the waters of the earth. When God withdraws his spirit, life ceases. Life is just starting on earth here! It's so exciting, the potential of it all

Introduction to Genesis

"Genesis" - means origins or beginning, which ya know, is pretty appropriate as it is the first book in the bible! It gives the account of the origin of the earth and the human race (chapters 1-11) and the beginning of the nation of Israel (chapters 12-50). It was written by Moses whilst he was in the Wilderness of Sinai.

It was four major key concepts, that are crucial in understanding the rest of Genesis, and the entire bible and Christianity. 

1. God is the only true and living God who created us and the world. 
2. All people have rebelled against God and sin has entered the world.
3. God judges us and the actions we do. 
4. Sin is still around today

  It is also split into sections and chapters!

• Creation (1 - 2)
• Fall of Man (3)
• Adam and his Family (4- 5)
• The Flood (6-10)
• Tower of Babel (11)
• Abraham (12 - 23)
• Issac (24 - 26)
• Jacob (27- 36)
• Joseph (37 - 50)