In the beginning God created. Genesis 1
I’ve overheard a few people refer to themselves as not being creative compared to others. If we are made in the image of God and God is creative and creates things, then we’ve got no excuse to create and continue to create till our time on earth is complete. Paul encourages Timothy to fan into flame the gift of God within him. God makes the deposit in our lives, but we have to develop it. What am I doing differently this year to develop the gifts and talents God has entrusted to me?
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. Was the earth in existence when God was there in the beginning? Or does this statement refer to the momentary state of things as God began to create? And this is why I’m hopeful that where I am is not the final story. We’re all works in progress in the Potter’s hand. Let’s not judge anyone based on what we can see or know about them today. We won’t recognise them when God’s finally done.
The earth was without form (no order), void (empty and with no purpose), and dark (lacking clarity for direction). For many of us, this describes our lives before we met Jesus. When we share the gospel with someone who has not been to the cross yet, our prayer is that their lives will become organised and ordered by God’s Spirit, they will no more live aimlessly but begin to pursue God’s purpose and no longer be bound by the stronghold of darkness but have clarity to lead a life that pleases God.
If we are made in the image of God, are creating things, it will be a great idea to crosscheck ever so often to ensure that similar to what God did at the beginning, whatever we choose to invest our time, resources and effort is bringing some form of order and organisation to replace the chaos around us, is enabling God’s purpose to be achieved and bringing the light of the gospel to the darkness we encounter. Lord, help us this year to be fruitful, leaving an imprint on our generation.
Although God’s mission was to create a functional earth aligned with His purpose, not much could be accomplished in the dark and hence the next and immediate priority was to create light. Without light, any passion to create some order or purpose will soon be impractical and futile. What dark areas of my life is God shining His light on, so I can focus on those and address them this year? We must ensure we’re expending lots of time, effort and resources to tackle what God considers as priority. Lord we need your light this year to guide our feet and path.
Every subsequent day of creation resulted in several aspects of the earth ordered and aligned with God’s ultimate purpose. Our lives are divided into several aspects and focusing our attention or focus on only one or two will be doing ourselves a disservice. It won’t be too long before we realise that the disorder and the lack of purpose in one aspect of our lives will soon have a significant impact on the others. We can’t isolate our spiritual lives from our health or finances, our personal growth will be reflected in the quality of our relationships. This year let’s ask God for wisdom as He progressively brings order and purpose to the different aspects of our lives.
The light that was created to bring light upon the earth and also to differentiate between day and night was from the firmament in the heaven. I struggle to understand when people claim that the solution to many of our problems are within ourselves. This verse is comforting as we realise that we can’t save ourselves and can’t bring order and purpose to our lives on our own, we desperately need light from a source outside ourselves to give us order, purpose and direction. We will continue to grope in darkness without the Spirit of God.
The other day, some short video popped up on my page as someone was shouting while preaching and asking those gathered to pray against being a ‘lesser’ light as he referred to Genesis 1.16. In a day and age when everyone wants to be great, let’s be reminded that it was God who created both the greater lights and the lesser lights. We can’t all be on the stage or in the spotlight, God wants some of us in the background and that’s ok. Whether our assignment is in the miraculous or in the mundane, it’s God’s glory that matters in the end. Sadly, some people’s personal and selfish agendas seem more important than making Christ known.
After God made the animals in the sea and the birds, he blessed them and instructed them to be fruitful and multiply but this isn’t repeated to the animals on the earth. But this blessing and instructions to be fruitful and multiply is repeated after he created man. Why does God do this and what does he hope to achieve by blessing some of his creation and not another group? But he also instructs man to have dominion over some things (the animals in the sea, air and on land) but not over other things he had created. I wonder if the exhaustion and frustration I feel sometimes is a reflection of me trying to control what God hasn’t asked me to or if the things God has asked me to dominate are instead taking over my life?
At the end of each day, God declared as ‘good’, what he had made but at the end of sixth day, when living beings were finally made in the image of God, this declaration was upgraded to ‘very good’. I wonder if this year would be the year we would go above and beyond in our commitment to serve the Lord, if God would look down on us this year and declare something different as we submit to be led by His Spirit, as Christ is formed in us and the fruit of His Spirit evident in our lives. At the end of the day, it’s not the opinion of others that matter but God’s final assessment.