OLD TESTAMENT

THE emotional health of a human being depends partly on an awareness of one’s roots. Persons who have been adopted usually want at some stage to rediscover their natural parents, just to satisfy a deep longing.

In the same way, the spiritual health of an individual, and even more of a group of people, depends partly on knowing their own story. Such knowledge puts the present into context and provides pointers for the future.

The book of Genesis provides people of all races, cultures, and generations with a set of roots. Its first ten chapters address some of the deepest questions anyone can ask. Where did the world come from? Is it planned or just an accident? Why is there so much bad in the world now? What does God think about human wickedness?

Then in chapter 11 the story focuses on the family of one man, Abraham, which is to become the nation through which God promises to reveal himself to the world. The ‘people of God’ prove to be quite ordinary and extremely fallible. The ‘Patriarchs’ are not saints.

Genesis is a preface to the story of God’s people. Christians who rank Genesis and the Old Testament below the New Testament Gospels and letters are ignoring their roots. The ‘Christ event’ springs from the opening chapters of the Bible.

All in a day’s work?

THE chief conflict between science and Christian belief has centred on the interpretation of the ‘days’ of creation. Scholars have suggested that they might be unspecified periods of time using ‘day’ poetically (as in Psalm 90:4 or Isaiah 2:11) or part of a liturgical celebration pictured as a week’s work.

If the author’s purpose was theological rather than descriptive, then the issue of creation’s mechanics must assume a secondary place. The book of Job (chs 38,39) calls for humble agnosticism in the face of processes far beyond human understanding. (This applies as much to Christians anxious to maintain biblical integrity as to scientists anxious to explain the beginning of time).

However, Christians also believe that the author chose his words carefully, and therefore ‘day’ must have some significance. For today’s readers, perhaps the compactness of the story is a welcome balance to the mind-numbing statistics of the age and expanse of the universe.

From God’s point of view, what is immense to us was really just a few days’ work for him. The universe is not then such a frighteningly big place after all. There is Someone behind it so powerful that, as Isaiah says, he can hold the oceans in the palm of his hand and count the drops.

With that in mind, Christians do not need to fall out over the precise interpretation of ‘day’. That God spoke everything into existence, when previously nothing was there, is the important truth to grasp.

---

– A narrative on Genesis 1

THE biblical account of creation is primarily theology. It answers the age-old questions, ‘Why is there a world?’ and ‘Why is it the way it is?’ in timeless terms from which people in every culture can gain insight.

For example, as the twenty-first century dawned people sought some unifying principle in holding together the vastly complex and apparently random systems of nature. Genesis reassured us by showing how God weaved order out of chaos as part of his creative task.

It tells us that God is the one constant of the universe. He is uncreated and the reason for all that exists.

Christians may see in the passage a hint of God as a Trinity who uses the ‘royal we’ at the creation of people (1:26). There is also a reference to the Spirit of God (v 2). God is portrayed as a personal being, not simply as a ‘force’.

We notice him to be a methodical Creator. He leaves nothing to chance but has an eye for detail. What he makes is good; it reflects his character and is pleasing to see. Built into it are the seeds of life reproducing itself at all levels. Creation is not a part of God but separate from him.

The ultimate purpose of his work is to make an environment fit for human beings. They are made in God’s image, that is, they are capable of moral choice and of a willing relationship with him. They are not trapped in a body of instincts and desires but can transcend their physical limitations in a way that no other part of the animal creation can.