Thursday, July 31, 2008

Chapter One

The first chapter of Genesis details the creation of the world in 6 days. While it is not stated whether or not it was truly 24 hours or not, as many detractors or scoffers may subscribe to, I believe it was. In fact, it probably took even less in the sense that God spoke things into existence. Having being Omnipotent, God would have had power to "make things happen". Did he need time? Probably not.

Beautifully, yet succintly written, it proves God's absolute power. "And God said, let there be light, and there was light". Nothing else needed to be said. No flashy effects, just plain existence. There was nothing to describe the process, for I believe there probably was none. And "it was good". And so it is. Everything in the world perfectly created, and set in perfect balance, showing how it could not have been pure coincidence.

Looking around at the beauty around us, and learning about science and nature just solidifies the fact that there are no accidents. The mysteries of nature, or perhaps the plain, yet unbelieved fact of it shows that nothing short of a perfect being could have done all this. The world's scientists may be able to create things, yet no one has been able to create out of nothing. As the story goes, God took away the ingredients needed to create and the scientist could do nothing more.

The creation of Man in God's own image is another beautiful passage. But it also sets me thinking. Does God look like us? A face, hands, legs like us? I cannot answer this question. But I believe at the very least God would function a little like us. A consciousness like ours, except with perfect knowledge and power. Perhaps this was what the Bible was trying to say? I wont ever know till I meet Him again in the last day.

6 days. And everything was well done. And Amen to that.

Chapter 2

Chapter 2 talks more about the creation of Adam and Eve, as well as the geographical location of the Garden of Eden. It also talks a little of how the Earth was like at that point of time.

From my understanding, the Garden of Eden probably was home to all species of animals at that point of time (minus adaptations which I will elaborate more later). There was no rain on Earth either. It was a fertile and rich land full of precious stones and natural resources. And of course, the 2 famous trees.

There are a few points that I'd like to discuss here. First, where is the Garden of Eden now, considering that the Bible described it quite well? With the current level of technology using satellite imaging, it could be totally possible to find out its location. As we read in Chapter 3, after the fall of man, Eden was restricted and guarded. Whether physically there are Cherubs posted there as well as a flaming sword, I do not know. It may be possible that this was so before the Great Flood, but subsequently the place was removed/destroyed by the great flood.

Secondly, what was Man like? Definitely not without the intellect, nor without free will. But with free will, it cannot be said that Man did not already know right from wrong. Why then the need for a tree of knowledge of Good and Evil? If God had given Man a warning, Adam and Eve would then have known what not to do. An explanation perhaps, was that they were as children. Children that had not yet reached the age of accountability. Just as Luke wrote in Lk 18:16-17, children that would have been accepted into Heaven. The tree probably turned them into accountable adults.

Chapter 3

The chapter describes the fall of Man from God's grace but disobeying the command not to eat of the forbidden fruit. Clearly it is strange that the serpent could talk, but I suppose that Satan possessed it in order to fool Eve. Using a white lie that they would not die upon eating (referring to physical death rather than spiritual), the serpent used the 3 lusts (1 Jn 2:16) as well, and Eve fell for it, dragging Adam along with her.

As previously discussed, Man since then became aware, first of which was shame. As a result, the covered their nakedness and hid, despite being the only humans around. Upon God's rhetorical question "where art thou", Adam explained what had happened, playing the blame game trying to push the blame to the serpent. What continues is the first of the Messianic Prophecies in verse 15, fulfilled by Jesus Christ.

God also pronounced judgment upon man and women, through labor pains and hard work to survive. In addition, as they were aware (God referred them "as one of us"), they were driven away from the Garden of Eden and subsequently prohibited access to the Tree of Life.

Why did God allow this to happen, having full knowledge? We may never know. But we see here how fallible man can be, as well as how close God regards man to be like Him. Here ends all description of the Garden of Eden, but we can imagine it to be a miniature Heaven on Earth.

Chapter 4

In this chapter we learn about Cain and Abel. Here we once again see the sin of man manifested in Cain's actions. Not only was his sacrifice to God acceptable, he was angry and proceeded to kill his brother.

It is interesting to see the brothers offering sacrifices. From this we can see that there was worship even back in those days. And there was a right and wrong way of worship as well. I suppose God already expected worship from man back in the beginning as well.

We can also learn that God takes care of His people, including Cain himself by setting a mark on him to prevent him from being hunted down. Then came the next son of Adam and Eve, who was called Seth. From Seth did the line of God's people descend. It is not known about the total number of offspring from Adam and Eve, but we can assume that they had sons and daughters apart from these 3. Otherwise it would have meant that God created other men, but this was not true.

posted at 7:10 AM

Introduction