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STUDY 5: GOD THE CREATOR

© Rosemary Bardsley 2023

A. GENESIS 1:1

‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth …’ – Genesis 1:1.

This opening statement of the Bible is the foundation upon which the whole of the Bible rests. And it is the foundation upon which his practical goodness rests. In these few simple words we are told who God is, who we are, and what the relationship between us and God is.

God is the Creator. We are created beings. The relationship between us and God is this: that we are totally dependent on him and answerable to him. In the original creation this was a relationship of trust, freedom and joy – life was a gift, not a burden.

This opening statement of the Bible highlights both the wrongness of sin and the necessity for trust. It points to the foolishness of rebellion against God and the wisdom of obedience to God.

Those who call this statement ‘myth’ and those who deliberately or ignorantly deny it altogether undermine the whole of the scripture.

If God is not the Creator, nor can he sustain us and the world.
If God is not the Creator, nor can he be the Sovereign Lord.
If God is not the Creator, nor does he have the authority to interfere and intervene in our lives.
If God is not the Creator, nor does he possess power over nature.
If God is not the Creator, nor does he have authority over the nations.
If God is not the Creator, nor does he have any say about what is right and what is wrong .
If God is not the Creator, nor does he have authority over life and death.

The eternal One, the Holy One, the personal, triune God, who existed before the beginning of time and space, is the Creator of the world and of us, and as such, is the Sovereign Lord of all. Because God’s act of creating confirms his sovereignty – his power and authority – it also affirms and empowers his goodness.

Discussion question:
Think about each of the indented statements above, and suggest how our perception of the goodness of God is undermined in each of these areas if we deny that he is the creator of all that exists.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

B. THE GOODNESS OF THE ORIGINAL CREATION

Read these this extended study  on God as Creator, and this one.

If we believe any of the theories of evolution we have to discard the idea that the original creation was good. Every evolutionary theory includes millions of years of suffering and death prior to the existence of humans. Even theistic evolution, which tries to fit the Bible into the current scientific theories, believes that God created everything using the process of evolution – that is, that God used millions of years of suffering and death to bring all the living things that we see today, including us, into existence.

This not only denies the Genesis 1 statements of the goodness of the original creation. It also challenges many other biblical concepts, including the goodness of God.

[The biblical conflicts with the theory of evolution are addressed here. ]

Bible study. What do these verses say about various parts of the original creation?
Genesis 1:4

Genesis 1:10

Genesis 1:12

Genesis 1:18

Genesis 1:21

Genesis 1:25

Genesis 1:31

When God created, he looked at what he had created, and saw that it was good or very good. There was nothing there that was not good – there was no pain, no suffering, no death. [We will look at the beginning of these things in a later study.]

Bible study questions:
What else do you find here that tells you the original creation was actually good?
Genesis 1:22

Genesis 1:28

How do these verses indicate that the original, very good creation was complete?
Genesis 2:2, 3

 

How do the above verses rule out the various evolutionary theories?

 

 

C. THE UNIQUE GOODNESS OF THE EARTH

God does not give us in Genesis a detailed description of all the processes involved in his creation of the universe: he does not mention a whole plethora of facts. He does not tell us, for example, that the earth rotates on its axis, that the earth and other planets orbit the sun, that the moon controls earth’s tides, how the law of gravity operates, how our bodily organs function, how our eyes see and our ears hear, and so on. Genesis 1 is not a science textbook. But this does not mean that the facts that it does state are not scientifically true.

Despite billions of dollars spent searching for life somewhere in space, the earth God created for us to live on is the only planet known to have all of the many (some suggest there are over two hundred) factors necessary to support life. Here is a list of eleven of the more important factors necessary for a habitable planet:

1. Liquid water
2. Orbiting the right kind of star – a star that is not too cool, not too hot
3. Correct distance from the sun – not too far away, not too close
4. Right location in the galaxy
5. Protection by giant planets
6. Moon to stabilize the tilt of its axis
7. Terrestrial planet
8. Thin enough crust to maintain plate tectonics
9. Heat still in its core to generate a magnetic field from the iron it contains
10. Atmosphere with enough oxygen to support complex life
11. Sufficient land to support diverse life. [Sourced from DVD The Privileged Planet, Illustria Media]

The mathematical probability of all the factors needed to sustain life being present at the same time in the same place in the very vast universe is extremely small, so small as to render it a mathematical impossibility. That these life-sustaining factors are all present, and only present, on this one very small, and otherwise very insignificant, planet called ‘earth’, is not the random, unplanned, result of long ages of time plus chance. The earth exists in the form it exists because of the deliberate and purposeful goodness of God.

Here, in Genesis 1, we read of God creating such a planet – the ‘earth’ - [along with the entire universe – ‘the heavens’ – in which it exists as the solitary inhabited planet] in six days. Everything that God did in those six days, indeed in the first four days, he did with the deliberate intention of creating life on this planet. In the first four days God created, out of nothing, ‘the earth’ – with all the above factors, and more – as a place for human habitation.

Evolution teaches a purposeless, mindless, random, long, drawn-out evolution of all that exists. Genesis 1 reveals the deliberate, intentional creation of a world completely and immediately suitable for habitation by an innumerable variety of vegetable and animal life forms, and, over and above all, by human beings. This purposefulness of the natural world is referred to by the word teleological – which means ‘with an end/goal/purpose in view’. Step by step, day after day, God, with us in mind, deliberately prepared a place for us, then created us. God, in an action of supreme and very wise goodness, created a place specifically designed for life, for our life. For us.

Bible study: How do these texts help you to see the goodness of God in creating the world for us to live in?
Psalm 16:2

Psalm 24:1

Psalm 33:5 – 9

 

Psalm 65:9 – 13

 

Psalm 95:1 – 7

 

Psalm 107:43 (read the whole Psalm)

 

1Corinthians 10:25, 26

 

D. CREATION, FAITH AND THE GOODNESS OF GOD

[1] Martin Luther stood in awe of the goodness of God in creation and providence:

‘The first article teaches that God is the Father, the creator of heaven and earth. What is this? What do these words mean? The meaning is that I should believe that I am God’s creature, that he has given to me body, soul, good eyes, reason, a good wife, children, fields, meadows, pigs, and cows, and besides this he has given to me the four elements, water, fire, air, and earth. Thus this article teaches that you do not have your life of yourself, not even a hair. I would not have a pig’s ear, if God had not created it for me. Everything that exists is comprehended in that little word “creator.” (Sermons I, ed. and trans. John W. Doberstein, vol. 51 of Luther’s Works, p. 163.)

Reflection: Rewrite the above article replacing Luther’s lists and comments about what he has from God with the truth of your own life - what you have from God:

 

 

 

 

[2] Karl Barth recognized that belief in God as Creator is a matter of Christian faith; it is not, he says, something that is equally accessible to and accepted by everyone regardless of whether they have faith or not. In his lecture on ‘God the Creator’ (Article 1 in the Apostles Creed) he says:

‘When we approach the truth which the Christian Church confesses in the word ‘Creator’, then everything depends on our realising that we find ourselves here as well confronted by the mystery of faith, in respect of which knowledge is real solely through God’s revelation. The first article of faith in God the Father and His work is not a sort of ‘forecourt’ of the Gentiles, a realm in which Christians and Jews and Gentiles, believers and unbelievers are beside one another and to some extent stand together in the presence of a reality concerning which there might be some measure of agreement, in describing it as the work of God the Creator. What the meaning of God the Creator is and what is involved in the work of creation, is in itself not less hidden from us men than everything else that is contained in the Confession. We are not nearer to believing in God the Creator, than we are to believing that Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. It is not the case that the truth about God the Creator is directly accessible to us and that only the truth of the second article needs a revelation. But in the same sense in both cases we are faced with the mystery of God and His work ...’ (Dogmatics in Outline, p50).

Discussion questions about Barth’s quote:
Think about the mindset of your culture today. What is the dominant belief about the origin of everything that exists?

 

How does this confirm what Barth says above – that knowing God as the Creator is a matter of revelation and faith, something that is not understood by everyone who looks at the same world?

 

Read Romans 1:18 – 25. How does this help you to understand the contemporary mindset which rejects the truth that God is the Creator of all things, and also rejects the goodness of God?

 

Read 2Peter 3:5. What does this tell you about how people respond to the evidence of the goodness of God in the created world?

 

 

REVIEW
Bottom line: God, freely, out of sheer fatherly goodness, created the universe and us. We, and the universe, exist only because of his goodness.

Review questions:
Make a list of things that are part of creation that are necessary for your existence. To whom do you consciously or sub-consciously give credit or thanks that you actually have those things?

 

 

What do you possess that is not ultimately the result of God’s goodness in creation?

 

How would it change your attitude to the physical things that make up your life if you deliberately remembered that you have them all, not as a right, not because of your own efforts, but as a gift from the goodness of God?