What Difference Does it Make

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This study is a bit fanciful, but it makes an important point.  I pray you read it with a meek heart.  Even if you don’t agree, hopefully you’ll get some new thoughts.

Was the world created 6,000 years ago and in 6 days?  What difference does it make?  Does that belief make you more powerful, more wise, loving, patient, joyful?  If the world was created 6 billion years ago, would that make you a worse Christian?  Would it hamper your ability to love others?  Would it render you ineffective in life and in love?  Why oh why would anyone take their righteous stand on such an unprovable belief?

I believe the term being used is “Creationism,” which is the belief that God literally created all things in the 6 days written about in Genesis 1:3 – 31.  There are men whose entire “ministry” is proving this and attempting to convince others that this is so.  Such a waste!  Believing God created all things in 6 days doesn’t save me!  Neither does it infuse me with God’s character, His love and joy and peace.  It does not increase my faith in Christ, my hope.  (Neither does believing the earth is 6 billion years old condemn me to hell}.  So what good is it?

I know some will say, “It’s all about the integrity and accuracy of God’s Word (the Bible).  If we can’t believe Him in Genesis, then how can we believe Him anywhere else?”  I will answer, “Is that so?  So your understanding of creation is what makes God’s Word accurate and powerful and effective in my life?  How truly prideful and egocentric you are.”  Because when anyone tells me we need to read and believe the Bible literally as it is written, I know what they are really saying is “You need to see it the way I do.”

Do you honestly think there is no other understanding of creation, of what is written in Genesis, different than your own?  There is, for sure.  I’d like to show you some of what I understand, and when I am done showing it to you, it will make absolutely no difference in our relationship with God, or with His Son Jesus Christ.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.  (Genesis 1:1, 2)

These first two verses occur before all the following verses.  Some may think the first 2 verses speak generally about all creation, where the following verses go into detail, but there is no mention in verses 3 and following of any creation of earth or water  “The waters” already existed before verse 3.  “The heavens” already existed before verse 3.  Nowhere in the following verses does it talk about God creating the heavens, the earth, or water, because they’d already been created before verse 3.  (Well, okay I’ll give you a single “heaven” in verse 8).

“The heavens” include the spiritual realm (angels for one) and space (the sky, outer space); “the earth” includes all physical creation, including water.  It isn’t until verse 10 that God specifies the dry land to be called “earth” and the waters “seas.”

The first “was” in verse 2 in the King James Bible is not italicized, but the second “was” is italicized.  Words are italicized (in the Kings James version, one of the reasons I really like it) when there is no corresponding word in the ancient text from which it was translated.   The fact that the first “was” is not italicized is telling us that there is actually a Hebrew word in the text which is being translated.  It is the Hebrew word for “to become.”  The earth “became” without form, and void.

(There exists no past tense form of the verb “to be” in the ancient Hebrew texts; hence every time you see “was” or “were” they’re always italicized, except in cases like I’m detailing here).

Did God create the earth “without form, and void?”  No.  It became that way.  Isaiah uses the exact same phrase “without form” (in the original Hebrew).

For thus says the Lord Who created the heavens; God Himself who formed the earth and made it; He has established it, He created it not in vain (without form), He formed it to be inhabited;  (Isaiah 45:18a)

The earth which was created by God in Genesis 1:1 was created to be inhabited, but it became uninhabitable, and so God did what is recorded in the following verses.   These are the so-called “6 days of creation,” detailed beginning in verse 3;
Day 1) Light.  Divided light from darkness.  Light He called Day.  Darkness He called Night.
Day 2) Firmament between the waters, calling it “heaven.” Gathered waters under heaven in one place, calling them “seas,” and dry land appeared, calling it “earth.”
Day 3) Grass and herbs and trees.
Day 4) Sun, moon and stars in heaven.  Division of day and night.
Day 5) Living creatures, on land, in the water, and in heaven (the sky).
Day 6) Man in the image of God

Some questions I don’t have answers for, just from reading these verses.
1)  He created light, day and night the first day, but created the sun, moon and stars the 4th day.  How did He divide light and darkness before day 4?  What gave off light before the sun?
2)  After he created light and separated light and darkness, it says, “The evening and the morning were the first day.”  What about the afternoon?
3)  He created growing plants on day 3, but not the sun until the next day.  Don’t plants need the sun to survive, or did God figure they could handle one day without it?

In verse 6 God decides to put a “firmament” between the water, but He makes no mention of creating water.  When and where did He create “the waters?” Nowhere in the 6 days of creation does it say that God created water or land.  The waters He speaks of in verse 6 already existed in verse 2, which existed before the 6 days of creation, as did the land!  God never said, “Let there be water” or “Let there be land.”  Water and land already existed from verse 1, but creation became overrun with water, according to verse 2.

And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.  And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so.  And God called the firmament Heaven.  And the evening and the morning were the second day.
(Genesis 1:6-8)

This “firmament” is heaven.  Some may think this is the sky.

And it came to pass, as he sowed, some fell by the way side, and the fowls of the air (ouranos – heaven) came and devoured it up.  (Mark 4:4)

Some may think that these verses in Genesis are telling us that there used to be a band of water above the sky, which no longer exists, because it came down and flooded the earth in the time of Noah.

And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.  In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.  And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.  (Genesis 7:10-12)

But verses 16 & 17 of Genesis tell us:

And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also.  And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth.  (Genesis 1:16, 17)

So the firmament contains the sun, moon and all the stars.  Since this firmament (heaven) has separated water above it from water below it, and the water below it is the water on the earth, then the water which is above it must be beyond the stars.  This means there is a “shell” (at least) of water surrounding all of outer space.

Okay, I’ve presented some of the things I see in the record of creation as seen in Genesis.  Do you agree with me?  On every point?  What difference does it make?  I’m still learning.  I have never traveled back in time to see creation happen, nor to the outer reaches of creation to see whether or not there’s water there.  God has never given me revelation to actually see what took place when creation first came into being.

Why then would I take an adamant stand on my understanding of creation?  Why would I allow that understanding to come between me and anyone else, especially a brother in Christ?  Why would I define my Christianity by my understanding of creation, or my understanding of the end times?  Why would my opportunity to share the gospel of God’s love with another human being involve me telling someone adamantly that God created everything 6,000 years ago in 6 days?

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not unto your own understanding.  (Proverbs 3:5)

I do not trust my understanding of creation.  I’ve been a Christian, bible reading and bible believing Christian since May of 1974. I’ve studied and I’ve read about creation, in the Bible and what others have written about it.  But I do not trust my understanding.  I could be completely wrong, and that doesn’t bother me at all.  Because  I know my understanding of creation would not affect my relationship with God in Christ in the least!  I have gotten and do receive on a regular basis the revelation of Christ within, and that is more sure than any mental understanding I have of what I read in the Bible.

If and when it becomes necessary to my abundant life to have a definitely accurate understanding of creation, I know God will give it to me.  Until then, what I have written is (some of) what I have.  I enjoy reading Genesis and Revelation, but I do not trust what I understand of it, only what has been revealed to me by God.

Our understanding of past and future events (Revelation, as well as Daniel’s & Jesus’ prophetic foretellings) makes no difference at all in our standing before God as His children and our walk in Christ.  I enjoy my understanding of what I read in the bible, but I am always open to having my understanding corrected, improved, clarified.  My understanding of Genesis or Revelation is not my life or my glory.  The revealed Christ within is my life and my glory.

When Christ our life shall appear, then shall you also appear with him in glory.  (Colossians 3:4)

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Related Studies

If you enjoyed how this study challenged your thinking and opened up your understanding of Christ, click on one of the related studies below:

The Subjectivity of Truth
My Gospel
The Yoke of Humility and Meekness

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