Important Things about Genesis

  

Let’s start with baseball. In the Big Inning. So, let’s go to the top of the first.

Genesis means beginning.  Whether it’s the Hebrew-Beresheet—or the Greek translators and translation that demanded each book have a title, Genesis means beginning or in the beginning.

What do we see in the beginning?

God created.  God spoke everything into existence.  We believe that science is a good thing. Science explains a lot of things.  Science provides a methodology for discerning things of this world.

The scientific method is a good thing so long as the premise is sound.  Logic tells us that if the premise is false, anything thereafter may be proven true.  The math or reasoning may seem sound, but if the premise is false, it’s all smoke and mirrors from that point forward.

What is the premise?  God created.  There is no sound premise that goes from nothing—nonexistence—to existence without God.

Spontaneous creation is not a thing when there is nothing to begin with.

God created. We might add that God created and it was good.  There are no Oops scriptures. God created and it was good.

In the second inning, evil entered the world. We get the whole Adam and Eve, forbidden fruit, talking serpent in the garden story. 

We see disobedience for the first time.  The standard story gets wrapped up like this. 

After both people on the planet ate the fruit of the forbidden tree, God asked Adam, “Why did you do that?”

Adam said, “The woman told me to.”

God looked at Eve and she said, “The snake tricked me.”

And the serpent didn’t have a leg to stand on.

There was no trickery here.  The serpent offered facts and information for the woman to consider.  She did.  That fruit is pleasing to the eye. It must be good for food, and it has the potential for knowledge. Wouldn’t it be something to know what God knows?

The serpent twisted no arms and held no one at gunpoint.  Sin—transgression—missing the mark was a thing but it had not truly entered the human heart.  When it came into us, it was because it was invited.

Ouch!

We can be condemning.  We could say to Adam and Eve, “You had one rule!”

But we are vulnerable and eventually, even if we stood in Eve’s place, sin would have come into the human heart.

Now sin is bad. If you ever go to seminary, know the answer to any question about sin is that “I’m against it.”

But realize through sin we know how great God’s love is. Now there is something to think on if the life you are living just seems too easy and you need something hard to think about.

How much more do we know God’s love because we have known sin?

We know that God uses everything for good for those who love him and are called according to his purpose and that includes sin.  Sin is not good but God will use it for good, at least for us.

We just finished Genesis and we know the words, what you intended for evil, God used for good.

God created us good but because we had sin in our lives, we know that God’s love is greater than the worst of the worst that we can be or do.

Let’s go to the third inning.  God destroyed the world.

Sin took off like wildfire, which the world probably hadn’t known yet. Do you know what else the world didn’t know?

Rain.

Wickedness prevailed upon the earth. God judged the earth and gave it the death sentence, except for a small remnant.  You know this part as Noah and the flood.

After the flood, men once again put their own purposes above those of God.  God confused the language of men.

If you are about to fail English and you can’t do enough extra credit to pass, try the God confused language approach as a last resort and pray that your teacher has read the Old Testament.

From this point forward, God will begin the process of choosing a people from all the peoples of the earth, once the earth is repopulated enough for the endeavor.

We see much of the story told through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but it is Jacob’s sons who will get God’s Chosen People into captivity in Egypt.

Joseph is the lead character here.  He saved the known world and brought all of his father’s family into Egypt where they remained in captivity until the Exodus.

There is no Exodus or wilderness time or Law of Moses or claiming of the Promised Land without the captivity.

There is no story of God’s Chosen People, a royal line that begins with David and leads to Christ without this population explosion in the captivity of Egypt.

Here is a premise that I want you to consider.  Exodus is the beginning of the story of God’s Chosen People.  Then what is Genesis?

Genesis is the prologue.  Genesis sets the stage.

Genesis shows us a God who is sovereign.

We see a God who is mighty.

We see a God who chooses whomever he wants to do whatever he wants.

We see the beginnings of a Chosen People with the call of Abraham and a sign in the flesh.

We see the blessings of God bestowed as God pleases not as man deems appropriate.

We see the beginning of a call to be a blessing.

We see the brokenness of the human heart and the sinful nature of human actions and a God who has begun a relationship with us that brings us to completion with Christ Jesus.

In that completion, we have reconciliation, restoration, and redemption.

We have read the prologue.  The greatest story ever told is on the horizon.

Amen.