Genesis 1:3 Commentary and Bible Study

The first manifestation of it to be recorded is light – ‘Let there be light.’ There is not going to be a sun until the fourth day, but there is light directly from God. It floods that darkness at God’s word, at his command. Perhaps all wave lengths of energy, not just light, are compounded in that statement. The sun would be created afterwards, but that would only be a means of giving light. The sun actually is not necessary in the creation account, God can directly create light energy and all other energy and so the sun is a servant. It was created later on, on the fourth day. It is not the big thing. Of course it is to us, and we read the scientific accounts of the sun and from our feeble standpoint we cannot comprehend the energy that it represents, the power, the fierceness, the immensity of the sun, and yet it is a secondary item. It is a servant. God is saying in the way he goes about creation, that he is the founder of light and of all things and he can devolve that duty to the sun and make it an energy-bearing body, just at a word, and the sun must then get on with the job. But it is God who directly energises everything and provides light at first. The New Testament tells us that all things actually were made by Christ, ‘by him and for him’. It doesn't say that here, but we are told later on that it was Christ in particular, the second person of the Trinity who was the agent of creation. Certainly, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all involved, but there's a sense in which Christ in particular is involved. So with New Testament understanding, we may say, ‘And Christ said, Let there be light: and there was light.’ The special thing about it is that this is obviously something sudden. Let there be light. What happened? Was there a tiny glimmer, perhaps, and over thousands of years, the glimmer got stronger, and after many thousands of years, it was really quite bright? That is nonsense, you say. Just to read the passage as it stands, is to read of something instantaneous. At the very command of the Almighty God through Christ the Son, light sprang into being instantly. This is true of all the creative acts that follow.