Genesis 1:1-2:4a Commentary

Pastoral Need

In Sunday school, you’d be invited to make a little booklet with one page for each day, a drawing of dark and light, earth and sky, dry land and seas, sun and moon, etc. And that’s how God made the whole thing — out of nothing — one day at a time.

In Sunday school we may have been taught that this Genesis account was an answer to the question: HOW was the world was created? God created the heavens and the earth!

You move forward in life until, at some point in your education, you discover that there are alternate theories out there. Some guy named Darwin posited that the world was created by an evolution of species over millions of years, from the most simple cells to the diversity of creatures and landscapes we have today. And maybe you got a little stuck because “That’s not what my Sunday school teacher told me.”

Plenty of Sunday school graduates have wrestled with their faith, if not outright thrown their hands up and walked out of church, because of this tension.

Commentary:

But you know what? The original recipients of this story would have never asked that question. “How” it happened simply wasn’t of any concern to them. What the Israelites noticed was that all the other religions and cults around them in the ancient near east had stories of the world’s creation, origin stories. And these stories did not answer the question “how” (at least not in any literal sense) so much as answering the question “why.”

WHY did God create the heavens and the earth?

What is creation’s purpose?

And, inasmuch as we are a part of the creation: WHAT is our purpose?

We give away too much when we assume, along with scientific rationalism, that what is most important is process and form. When we ask the question “how”, we’ve already deferred to a playing field that doesn’t suit our purpose. The question “how” does not suit the intent of the text.

So, let’s ask the better question: WHY does God create the heavens and the earth?

At the end of Exodus, we hear how God intends the construction of the Tabernacle. In fact, this is a common motif in ancient near eastern literature: the telling of the construction of a dwelling place for a god. Each element is crafted to serve a particular purpose in the space, to fill the tabernacle with beauty, with honor, with glimpses of royalty, even divinity. As the people move each of these furnishings into place, the text emphasizes the work with a refrain: “as the LORD commanded him.”

The foundations are put in place, “as the LORD commanded him.”

The curtain dividing the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place was put in place, “as     the LORD commanded him.”

The Table for the bread was placed, “as the LORD commanded him.”

And so on and so forth.

Until the second to last act of tabernacle construction: The priests move in and take up their stations, ready “to work and to keep” the sacred space. In the practices of ancient near eastern religions, the last piece to take up residence in the Temple was the idol, a representation of the presence of the god for whom this sacred space was created. Which is not unlike Exodus 40, verse 34, in which: “The cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled (you might even say “rested in”) the tabernacle.”

To make use of this rather strange detour, let’s return to the story of creation. Each day a new creation — out of nothing, save the command of God — emerges, serving a particular purpose in the space, filling the whole cosmos with beauty, with honor, glimpses of royalty, even divinity.

The second to last act of creation: humanity moves in and takes up their stations, ready “to work and to keep” the sacred space. Quite literally in the Hebrew, Adam is given the command “to work and to keep”. For the rest of the Old Testament, whenever this construction is present, it refers to the work of the priests in the Temple.

Until, at last, in the final move of creation, God moves in. God rests in God’s good creation.

John H. Walton, professor emeritus of Hebrew Scripture at Wheaton University, makes this case, arguing “In the ancient world, temple dedications were often seven days in duration. During those seven days, the functions of the temple would be proclaimed, the furniture and functionaries installed, the priests would take up their role and at the end, the deity would enter and take up his rest. If the cosmos is being viewed as a temple, Genesis 1 can be understood as presenting creation of the cosmos in terms of a temple dedication.”

So, why did God create the heavens and the earth?

As a dwelling place for God on earth, a place completely dedicated to worship and

to the glory of God. A place where God might walk with humankind in the cool of

the evenings.

WHY did God create humankind?

Because the upkeep of the Temple requires priests, especially attuned to the

intersection of God and this sacred space.

What is the purpose of Creation?

It is the place where God lives and where God is worshipped.

When we have dirt under our fingernails and a pile of weeds beside us? Or how we are beckoned out into the sunshine, dappling through the trees as we hike or the regular crash of waves, the blue of the waters touching the blue of the skies as we bury our toes in the sand? How about those moments when some wonder of creation — from the sunset at the Grand Canyon to the fuzzy bumble bee exploring the contours of a flower’s petalled surface — cause a “thank you” to well up inside of us? When we look into a microscope in a research laboratory, when we paint or write or compose. When we manage a staff team with dignity and good humor. When we develop public policy that honors creation and the Imago Dei in each person. We are priests appointed to the upkeep of God’s Temple, especially attuned to all of the interesting intersections between God and this sacred creation.

Worship Possibility: Earth as the Original Cathedral