Turn to Genesis 1.1, if you would. Let's talk about creation for
just a few minutes. If you really want to set an
evolutionist real and just ask him how the matter came to be
in the first place. We've got all these fancy ideas
about how the matter evolved, but how did the matter come about
in the first place? And of course, we have the answer in Genesis
1. Let's just read verses 1 and
2. In the beginning, God created
the heaven and the earth, 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. And then you have
the recount of the six days, the seven days, counting the
day of rest, and all that God did in those six days. I discovered
recently Actually, I think it's in the, what do you call that
Bible? It's in the notes of that one,
that it points out the parallelism in creation. On day one, you
have light created, light by itself. On day two, the firmament,
or the heavens, which were separating the waters from above from the
waters below it. Then on day three, God moves
into those waters below the firmament and separates the land out, so
the water from the land. Then in day four, the parallelism
starts because he comes back, and whereas on day one he created
light, on day four he creates the luminaries. And that's very
interesting all by itself, is that he created the light that
we know takes so many years to get here from the stars and the
sun. It doesn't take that long from
the sun. But he created the light, and then on day four, he created
the luminaries. Very interesting. On day five,
he created the birds and the fish. Remember, on day two, he had
separated out the waters from above and the waters below the
heavens and the earth. So on that parallel day five,
he created the inhabitants of those things, the birds in the
air and the fish in the sea. Then in day six, whereas in day
three he had separated the land out from the waters on earth,
he then populated the creatures on that land, including us. Very
interesting how God did this. First thing I'd like to do is
go over the Hebrew words for creation so that we can get that
under our belt, and then I'd just like to make a few observations
about creation today. The main word, and the word that's
used in Genesis 1-1, I shouldn't say the main one, it's really
not used that much, is bara. So the Hebrew word bara means
essentially, and it's the closest thing of all the Hebrew words
to meaning, to create out of nothing. The Latin phrase for
that is ex nihilo, so to create out of nothing, ex nihilo. What
bara means in the Hebrew is to cut or carve out, to form by
cutting. So the base word means to cut
or carve. And it's used in Joshua 17 of
carving wood. But it really means, in most
cases, to create or to produce, to make smooth, polish, hence
to fashion or create. It's use of these things. God
created the heavens and the earth. He created men in verse 27. That's
the same word barah. He created Israel in Isaiah 43,
one and 15. It also means to beget, because
the Hebrew word bar, which is from this bara, means son. And
it also means to eat, feed, grow fat from the cutting of food.
That's kind of a remote definition. When you look up bara in the
Hebrew lexicons, you see, or where it's used in the Bible,
you see that there's only half a page of the uses of bara in
the Old Testament, so it's not used all that much. We're gonna
go through a few of the uses in a minute. There's another
word in Hebrew called asah, asah. It has 16 pages of usage in the
Old Testament, so it's a huge word for being used in the Old
Testament for to make. But this is more of a word which
means to fashion or to manufacture from something. So the matter
is already there, and to form it or fashion it or manufacture
it into something else is this word, asah. It comes from to
labor or to work, as in gold and silver, to work in gold and
silver, to make produce, or to make and produce by labor. So it's more along the lines
of manufacture, fabricate. It's used of ships, altars, bricks,
garments, idols. So you can really see that that
word, asah, means more of manufacture from existing materials. Barah
means more to create out of nothing, whereas asah means to manufacture
or to reform something out of the materials. But you can't
be that strict on it, because sometimes asa is used of God
creating something out of nothing. You can't just be totally strict
on it. There is a third word that's used a lot in the Old
Testament for create, and it's yasar. It means to form or fashion. It's used of the potter, of the
potter. The noun form of it is the potter.
So to form or fashion. to form in the mind, to devise
a plan, is yasar also. And let me show you a verse,
let's just show you a few verses where a few of these words are
used so we get our heads on straight about the word create, the words
create. Turn to Isaiah 43, seven. Isaiah 43.7, you know that in
the Hebrew they like to, the writers like to use parallelism.
They'll say it a couple of different ways. And this is a good example
of that in Isaiah 43.7. It uses all three of these different
Hebrew words for create. Even everyone, let's pick up
verse six so we get the context. I will say to the north, give
up, and to the south, keep not back. Bring my sons from afar,
and my daughters from the ends of the earth. Even everyone that
is called by my name. For I have created him, that's
Barah. I have formed him, that's Yassar. Yea, I have made him, that's
Asah, all three of the Hebrew words in that one verse. So let's
go back to Genesis 1.1. Let me point out some of the
key uses of Barah in Genesis here. It's obviously in Genesis
1.1. In the beginning, God created,
and that is obviously to create something out of nothing. In
Genesis 1.21, And God created great whales
and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought
forth abundantly. Then, Genesis 1, 27. So God created
man in his own image. In the image of God created he
him, male and female created he them, Barah. Chapter 2, verse
3. And God blessed the seventh day
and sanctified it because that in it he had rested from all
his work, which God had created and made. All right, these are
two words, bara, created, and made, asah. This is really interesting
because it's got the Hebrew preposition law in front of the second word. So literally, it's saying which
God created to make. And so to me, it kind of means
he created out of nothing, the matter, and then he reformed
it into what he wanted to make it. So it's interesting in chapter
two, verse three. Then let's do turn to Isaiah
for some of the other uses. Isaiah 43, one. But now thus saith the Lord that
created thee, O Jacob. Now it's talking about the fact
that God created Israel. He created the nation of Israel.
And he that formed thee, O Israel. So that's in 43.1. Oh, I'm sorry. I have redeemed thee, I have
called thee by name, thou art mine. So there's the two words
which God created and formed. And then in 45.7, I form the light, that's yasar,
and create darkness, bara. God barad darkness. You think, you think, darkness
is nothing. That doesn't need creation. Well,
yes it does. God actually created darkness. I make peace and I create evil. There's create bara. God barad evil. Sometimes we have problems with
that, but it's right here. God barad evil. Chapter 45, verse 12. I have made the earth a saw,
there's the use of a saw, and created barah, man, upon it. Then 45, 18. For thus saith the Lord that
created Barah the heavens, God himself that formed the earth,
we've already been through this, Yassar, and he hath and made
it, Asar, Yassar and Asar. Then 5416, Behold, I have created the smith,
this is Barah, I have created the smith that bloweth the coals
in the fire, and that bringeth forth an instrument for his work,
and I have created, Barah, the waster to destroy. So God created
the smith to make something, and then he created the waster
to come along and destroy it. So that's the total sovereignty
of God in creation. We won't turn to that, but in
Isaiah 65, 17, he will create new heavens and a new earth.
So he will still create in the future. And in Psalms 104, 30,
well, let's turn there. Psalm 104, 30. Creation is continuous
in some ways. Psalm 104, 30 says, thou sendest forth thy spirit,
they are created, and thou renewest the face of the earth. And then
102.18, this shall be written for the
generation to come, and the people which shall be created shall
praise the Lord. So there's new nations and so
forth to be created. So that's kind of the use of
the word in Hebrew. Now I'd like to just bring you
like four thoughts in general on creation. The first thought
that I'd like to remind us of is indeed that God created matter
out of nothing. The Latin phrase is ex nihilo.
He did this out of nothing. There was nothing before God
created what we see here. In fact, there was no time before
he created. It all kind of went together.
In the beginning, God created the heaven and earth. Have you
ever thought about the fact that time is also a creation of God,
and it says it essentially right there, in our beginning of time,
God created the heavens and the earth. The Trinity, as a sub
points to this God creating out of nothing, we need to recognize
the fact that the entire Trinity, the three persons of the Godhead,
were involved in creation. Turn with me, if you would, to
John 1.3. And this also is pointing out
very vividly how it was creation out of nothingness. In John 1.3,
we read, this is talking about the Word, obviously, the Lord
Jesus, All things were made by him, and without him was not
anything made that was made. So there is the role of the Son
of God, the Word, in creation. He was the active agent of creation. Now turn to Hebrews 11.3. Wonderful
scripture that really adds ammunition to creation out of nothing. Hebrews 11.3 says, through faith
we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God
so that things which are seen were not made of things which
do appear. So, plain and simple, God created
matter out of nothing. And then, Colossians 1.16, And this once again is talking
about the Lord Jesus. For by him were all things created
that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible,
whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers,
all things were created by him and for him. Obviously that verse
includes the spiritual forces in the universe, angels, demons,
et cetera. They were all created. We don't
know the exact timing of that in relation to Genesis 1.1, but
they were all created. And the Son of God was the active
agent for that. Just imagine with me a minute
this fact of God creating out of nothingness. Our minds are
not probably capable of it, but can you just Try to imagine,
and you can't say the universe, it's not the universe, it's nothing.
Can you imagine God alone? And it's not in time, there's
no time, it's just him. And there's no time, there's
no world, there's no heavens and earth, that's what it was
for, we'll say eternity passed, but that's a time word. We'll
say before, but it's a time word, all of this was created. And
it's going to be that way. Of course, we get to exist forever
now. We didn't exist forever in the
past. We weren't in that nothingness. Only God was. Then he decided
to create us. Then we get to be with him the
rest of eternity. So he'll never be by himself
again, because he's created us. Mindful it's it's it's something
worth meditating on once in a while when you start when you need
reminder that maybe you're not as important So Imagine eternity passed with
God alone no time notice that in Genesis it says in the beginning
of That proves there was a beginning to time. And then it also says,
as he's going through the days, after that first day and then
every day thereafter, he says, evening and morning, first day,
or evening and morning, second day. So he created the Earth
and started spinning to make evening and morning, and that
was the beginning of all of this. So we're all in a temporary time
bubble now. The time bubble is going to be
burst when Jesus Christ comes back to Earth. Well, after the
millennium, after 1,000 years. But then it will be eternity. We won't count days, I don't
think. We'll be there forever. Before
the ages began. Let's turn to 2 Timothy 1.9.
Now, while you're imagining God by himself, with nothing else
but God. It's impossible to think of,
isn't it? But that's the reality. We have
this marvelous verse, 2 Timothy 1.9, that we actually were in
his mind. And that's something, isn't it?
2 Timothy 1.9. who has saved us and called us
with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus
before the world began. He actually says before the ages
began, which is often translated the world in the New Testament,
but it's literally before the ages began. Here's that time
thing again. Before time came into being and
the rest with it, We were in God's thoughts. That's just marvelous. We being the ones that Christ
was going to save were in God's thoughts. So, the first thought
about creation is that God really made all this out of nothing. The second thought is that God
sustains matter in creation In other words, this is not deism. Deism believes that God made
the world and all of this and just sent it going like you would
send a marble going across the floor by itself, said, bye-bye,
see you later, and let it all happen on its own. That's deism.
But the Bible doesn't teach us that because it teaches that
God, specifically the Lord Jesus Christ, sustains this whole thing
going. And we can understand laws of
physics and laws of the body and all of that, but really,
down below it all, God is sustaining all of this. Look at Colossians
117. Once again in this passage about
Christ, it's the verse right after the one we just read. And
he is before all things, and by him all things consist. That's the Greek word synastēka. It means to hold together, to
have the proper place, or to be formed or consist. So, I mean in school you can
learn all about these wonderful, I love the laws of physics and
the laws of what they think is true at the atomic level between
protons and neutrons and all the new quarks and stuff they've
discovered since I went to school. That's great stuff. And I'm not
decrying the validity of any of that. It's trying to explain
some of these laws God has formed. It's great. But the ultimate
force holding all of this together is the Lord Jesus Christ. We
subsist by him every day. You know, I love more than ever
the part of the prayer that says, Lord, give me, give us this day
our daily bread. It shows our dependence on him
every single day. And that's true because God sustains
the matter and his own creation every day. So it's not just a
creation that happened and then it's off on its own. to find
its own way through the universe. God will meet up with it later
and give judgment and all that. But it is a daily sustaining
of that creation. The third point I'd like to talk
about is just a little bit about how he did it. And this is so
interesting. And we can never understand all
this until we get to see him face to face. But it's fun to
think about it, I think. How did he do all this in the
beginning? Genesis 1, 1 and 2. Have you
thought about this? The first verse says, in the
beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. So, now that's
not on day one or day any of the six, that's just the fact,
that's kind of a summary verse. In the beginning, God created
the heaven and the earth. And then it goes on to tell about
how, after he created the matter, he formed it, I think, is my
understanding of what's going on here. And so the summary verse
tells you that he created matter out of nothing. And then it goes
on through the days to tell you how he formed that into a organized
something. Have you heard of the gap theory?
The gap theory is interesting, but I don't know that it has
any merit. The gap theory is that there's
a gap between verse one and verse two. And the reason is that they
think that God would not have formed something without form
and void. That's the Hebrew words tohu
v'bohu, very descriptive words. And what it means is that Tohu and bohu mean wasteness,
emptiness, vanity, desert. And then bohu means emptiness,
voidness. And in the Greek Septuagint,
you have aoratos, which means unsightly. And another word,
which means unfurnished. So a lot of people, say that
God created the heavens and earth, and then between verse one and
two, Satan fell, and chaos came into the world, and the earth
got messed up, and so God had to reform it. Well, if that's
all true, why didn't he tell us that? So I don't think that's
true. But it's interesting. What I think is really true is
that he created the matter, And that it was all kind of a swirling
mass of water and matter that he then went about forming into
an orderly world and heavens and separating things out. He
kind of went into a mode of separation and population after that original
creation of matter. You know, the Big Bang Theory.
I think all they say about it, they try to kind of ignore the
creation of something out of nothing, because nobody can deal
with it. So they just kind of say, in a flash, in that big
bang, matter came about. So kind of just sweeping under
the rug. But Google, go home and Google
what the evolutionists say about how to create matter out of nothing.
They don't have any answers. What you have is the earth was
without form and void right there at the beginning. It had wasteness
and emptiness and vanity to it and unfurnished and unsightly.
So God starts to form it into something. And the first thing
he does is he creates light, because there was no light yet.
So he creates light. And he starts the separation
process and the population process. Fantastic story of the different
days that he went to work on, first of all, separating out
the waters under the firmament from the waters above. So that's
the heaven and the earth separation. And then on the earth part, which,
you know, the earth's made of, what is it, four-fifths water?
Something like that. So all of this water and stuff,
he started separating the land out from the water to make that
happen. And then he creates the luminaries
to the sun and the moon and all the stars and so forth through
the days, ending up with us as the zenith of his creation, humans. So that was the third thought,
is just how did he do it? Great food for meditation. So God created matter out of
nothing. He sustains it every day. How he did it, and number four,
this I saved to last because I noticed another word, another
use of barah in all of this, and you're gonna love this. Turn
with me to Psalm 5110. I told you that bara is not used
very much in the Old Testament. It's kind of rare. It's next
to that other word, asah. So Psalm 5110 has bara in it. What do you think that is? This is the Psalm of David after
he'd done his great sin. He says, create bara in me a
clean heart, O God. and renew a right spirit within
me. So David is saying, God, create
something out of nothing. I need a clean heart, so please
create it in me. I thought that was just fantastic.
And then to go along with that, some of the other verses in the
New Testament that would kind of lend more ammunition to this. Turn with me to Ephesians 2. We think that the creation of
the world is a pretty fantastic feat, but the creation of a saint,
the creation of a Christian, the creation of a new heart in
a sinner is as good a feat or better to do that. Ephesians
2.10 and 15, Ephesians 2.10 says, for we are his workmanship. Now this is the New Testament,
so this is Greek, and the New Testament word is katidzo, for
create. It's a good word. For we are
his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which
God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. So we
are, and you know the verse in 2 Corinthians 5.17, that's also
the noun form of katidzo, which is katisis, we are a new creature. Remember that verse? We are a
creation. We are created. Now, this time it's not matter
coming about out of nothing, but it's a spiritualness out
of nothing. It is becoming a son of God.
It's becoming a Christian. That's a creation. And then Ephesians
2.15, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law
of commandments contained in ordinances, for to make in himself
of twain one new man, and that's so making peace. So that's the
creation. And then in Ephesians 4.24, and that you put on the new man,
which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
So the Bible is using this same creation word that was used in
Genesis 1-1, albeit in a different language, Hebrew and Greek, to
describe what happens to us in regeneration. Then Galatians
6-15, finally, For in Christ neither circumcision
availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. So in conclusion, I think it's pretty
fantastic about the creation of the world and the heavens
out of nothing. There's a lot in the Bible about
it. Genesis 1, the path to all those passages. And then the
supporting passages in Isaiah and so forth about how God created
all of this from nothing. I think it's interesting to involve
the Trinity in this creation and understand what parts the
Lord Jesus played in this. It's interesting that he sustains
us every day and that if he didn't do that, this creation would
just fly apart. And to think a little bit about
how he did it and and go toe-to-toe with evolutionists on that. And
then to finally figure out that one of the greatest things that
God has created is the new man, the new person in Christ that
we are.