Genesis 1:31 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

Navigator

Genesis 1:31

Comments

So now creation is complete. You see the build up to man who in chapter 1 is the highest point. We see one united Godhead – God alone pre-exists. The topic of chapter 1 is God’s wonderful handiwork and his thoughtfulness, and his almighty power in providing for his special creation, for man, who was the pinnacle of it all. So angels are not mentioned in chapter 1, because they are not relevant; there is just God and his creative work.It was very good; it was perfect. There was no sin in the world; there was no death in the world, and everything reflected the glory of the original creative work of God. There was no predation, no clawing and tearing apart of weaker creatures. That cruelty of nature, red in tooth and claw, would have been entirely out of place in a world into which sin had not yet entered. It was perfect in the sense of being not only flawless but also complete. There was no more creation by the end of the sixth day. God's creative work gave way to his sustaining work. That is so significant. You cannot have any kind of evolutionary process operating which depends upon animal death and cell death and decay. The entire theory of evolution is based upon that. Death has not come in until after the creation of man and the fall. The scene is set for the fall, among other things, in the next chapter. It is a wonderful paradise and we will find it so described. Several times the definition of each day is repeated: ‘and the evening and the morning were the sixth day’, so there is no question that the record is speaking of 24-hour days. That doesn't surprise us because this is a history book, not a book of poetry.

Application

Creation was literal, it teaches much, it shows us the infinite power of God and it also, by the way, illustrates the way of salvation. When God shines in the heart, dark as it may be, committed to evolution as it may be, unwilling to be convicted of sin and see spiritual need, then God causes the light to shine and it floods in and all these things become obvious to us. So we are reading in Genesis 1 about God’s almighty power. What would be the point, by the way, in God taking millions of years to create the earth? Just supposing there were millions of years of evolutionary process before Adam and Eve, what would be the point? What would God achieve by that? What would it say? Why would it take so long when he has the power to fulfil his purposes at a word? You don’t have to believe in a God who takes millions of years to do something, which might suggest in your mind some weakness or inability. You believe in a God and you trust him and you know him, who can shine the light into a heart and save the most stubborn and arrogant and wilful sinner in moments.

Questions

Is the creation of the world and man in six days a stumbling block to unbelievers, to evangelism? Well after so many generations of evolutionary battering, yes it is. That is the whole purpose in the devil ever bringing about the theory of evolution and inspiring it – to distract man and to make the gospel and the creative power of God seem to be ridiculous and absurd. But it is just as much a stumbling block to talk about sin, and to talk about hell, and condemnation, and to talk about God intervening and coming in the person of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour, and suffering and dying for sinners. But happily, salvation is a spiritual work, and the Holy Spirit is at work, and however drunken and befuddled we may be as unbelievers on evolution and evolutionary conditioning and ideas, when God works we can grasp the majesty and magnificence of it. So yes, humanly it is a stumbling block but that does not mean to say we recoil from it and say, ‘I must avoid that.’ No, God is at work in the work of salvation and creation is a foundational and vitally important doctrine, and God will move and convict and convince.

Some people have said – and they have meant well by this, but they have buckled in this way – ‘O, we think there has been an evolutionary process to produce the world, but God came in and Adam and Eve, our first parents, after millions of years of evolution, they were special creation.’ Well, that is very noble to leave God with Adam and Eve as his creation, but what about everything else? There is a great problem with that view, with the idea that evolution has taken place and God only started special creation with our first parents. The great problem is, that nature, evolution with all its savagery and destruction was taking place before the fall. So death is to be seen, and sin (if you like), and violence and greed, before the fall – and that cannot be. So we cannot accept that. No, Genesis 1 is God literally forming something, and allowing himself to be seen to do it, in stages – not too long so that it would detract from his power to do things instantly. But so that what he does is visible and understandable, he literally created in stages, and showed us at the same time his carefulness and his provision and his priorities, that man was the climax of creation.

There is no sin and there is perfect provision. Some say, and even some Bible teachers sadly say, ‘It was a story for primitive people. We should believe instead the findings of science about origins, the Book of Genesis is just God being kind to primitive people so that they can understand something of creation, where they would not understand a lesson in science.’ Well it is all very well to speak like that, but the way it is presented in the Bible, it would be God presenting a fiction, a lie. It is presented as history, as truth, and right through the rest of the Bible it is spoken of as literal truth and quoted and referred to as literal truth. So we cannot possibly accept that.

Outline

Purpose

Introduction

Genesis 1:31 Commentary and Bible Study