In the Beginning....

“AND IT WAS GOOD”
Genesis 1:1-2a
Faith United
May 18, 2008


Whenever I read this passage
I am reminded again of one of my favorite movies
“Dead Poets’ Society”
about a young professor played by Robin Williams
who comes to teach English at a snotty boys only prep school
The school prides itself on its staunch adherence to Tradition
and high academic quality
It’s not a place where one is encouraged to color outside the lines
or think their own thoughts
stick to the book, and you’ll do well
Then along comes Mr. Keating
who is passionate and spirited
particularly about the power of language and poetry
The first day of class
he has a student read the Introduction
in a textbook about poetry
The Introduction piece is a dry, boring, analysis of poetry
using scales and numbers to rate a certain poem
It’s all very intellectual and devoid of any emotional interaction
Just read the poetry like a text book and measure it
with scientific measurements
to judge its quality
After the student dutifully read the passage in the book
and many of the students took very careful notes
Mr. Keating got up and said to the class
one word:
“Excrement.”
One of my professors in seminary used to say something
similar when he was offended by an idea
that went against the glory of God:
He’s say, “bovine excrement.”
And that’s what Mr. Keating thought of this scientific method
of analyzing poetry
So the first act of the class that semester
was to rip out the entire introduction of the textbook
and the class learned that day
that poetry is not just something to be read
and analyzed
but poetry is something to be taken into yourself
tasted, experienced, enjoyed, celebrated
let it become a part of you
and awaken your senses
This week I read another example of what happens
when we use the Bible as a textbook
or just a bunch of paper with written words
In Olathe, Kansas, a man was arrested for possession of marijuana
This is a true story—
and when he came before the judge to offer defense
he based his defense on Genesis 1:29
where it says, “And God said, I have given you every herb bearing seed
which is upon the face of the earth….”
Judge Earl Jones, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune,
was not impressed with this man’s interpretation of Scripture
He said to the man
“as a mere mortal I’m finding you guilty
of possession of marijuana.
If you want to appeal to a higher authority,
that’s fine with me.”
The man was convicted and sentenced

I get very tired of people who use the Bible to argue anything
I get tired of people dissecting it like it’s a dead frog
to be picked apart and analyzed
and I get particularly offended
when people, anybody, use the Bible as a weapon
I also find that the people who scream the loudest
and are the most relentless and ferocious
when it comes to the Bible
are people who haven’t read the whole thing carefully
Look at Genesis 1 and 2, for instance
If you read those two chapters carefully,
you will see that there are two different creation stories
The first one ends at Chapter 2, verse 4
and the second one starts in Chapter 2, verse 5
They’re different
very different
I much prefer the first one
which is much richer and full of poetry
In the first creation story,
man and woman were created at the same time
made in the image of God
in the second story is that bit about man being created
he gets to name everything
and then he seems lonely,
so God does surgery on him
removes a bone and forms it into a woman
Why are there two different stories?
And how are we supposed to know which one
is true?
I get mentally disturbed
when people start arguing about scientific findings
vs. the stories of the Bible
I also realize that humankind goes to extremes
I understand, I do too
Billy Joel has a song called,
“I Don’t Know Why I Go to Extremes”
and I’ve always considered that my theme song
My husband has never argued against that
But I think we all do
It’s all or nothing
This or That
Us or Them
Good or Bad, with clear lines in between
And so it goes with the arguments about
how the world is made
It’s got to be all or nothing
It has to be exactly as Genesis 1 describes it
(by the way, no one ever deals with the second story
in this debate)
or it has to be Evolution started with a big impersonal Bang--
Either/or
All or nothing
And when we get caught up in those arguments
I believe we are missing the whole point
Genesis 1 is a poem,
it’s a hymn to the glory of God’s creative power
a celebration of God’s awesomeness
A celebration to the unspeakable power of the God
who can create something out of nothing
I don’t claim to know how God did it
If I understood that, I would be God
The Bible is not a history textbook
nor a science textbook
but it is a faith document
It contains the word of God
it is a witness to God’s greatness and power
and beauty
seen the eyes and senses of people long ago
The book of Genesis is attributed to Moses
or Moses and friends
but the thing is, the book of Genesis was written
after the people of God
were set free from slavery in Egypt
and sent to the Promised Land
After they had experienced that awesome deliverance
at the hands of God
they looked back and wrote about the beginning of the world
as they knew it
They’d come to know the power of this God, this Yahweh,
and the endless possiblities of what God can and will do
and has done
And I believe that we will never understand
no matter how smart we get
we will never understand the full complexities
of God’s creation
But look at what we’ve discovered over the centuries
look at what science has uncovered
about the most minute beings in the universe
or even the expanse of the universe
being far more than our human minds can comprehend
Creation is so much bigger than
than the people who wrote Genesis realized
They thought that Earth was mostly it
I’m not saying at all
that our intellectual progress
in any way negates the Bible
The Bible is still true
but with the passage of time and the gaining of more
intricate knowledge,
the Genesis story becomes more and more amazing
God has given us the gift of knowledge
and the ability to learn, discover, and continually
uncover new things
I don’t believe we’ll ever get to the fullness of knowledge
there is just that much to discover
I don’t know exactly how the earth and the planets
and the galaxies were created
I’m not that smart
It doesn’t matter to me how long it took God
to do it
it doesn’t matter to me HOW God did it
All that matters to me,
and the message of Genesis for me
is the incredible news that
however it came about
and in whatever time frame,
God is the author of it all

I admire people who can unravel great mysteries
as long as they know that their knowledge is limited

The Bible contains truths that transcend science and history
I don’t care if they find the ark of Noah
or the Shroud of Turin
or ancient chariot wheels on the bottom of the ocean
Because my faith doesn’t depend on scientific evidence
I don’t have to prove it
It is faith
That doesn’t mean I’m stupid
or that I ignore hard data or scientific evidence
I love to learn
I love to discover
and all that we discover about the complexities of the world
is just further evidence to me
of the awesomeness of God
who is the Author of it all

The beauty of Genesis is the power and the glory of God
who made all things
seen and unseen
things we haven’t discovered yet
God made those too
Did God do it in seven 24-hour days?
That’s not the point
The measurement of time is a human-made construction
we know very little about the origins of timekeeping
We do know the ancient Hebrews divided the week into 7 days
because 7 is a number of perfection and wholeness
completeness
But beyond that, we know very little
Except God made Day and Night
God put a rhythm in creation
from the very beginning
There is evening, there is morning
day after day after day
And if you notice,
each day begins, evening, morning
because for the ancient Hebrews
the day started at sundown
and it is described that way for the first six days
evening, morning, day
But when we get to the seventh day,
the rhythm changes
The seventh day doesn’t have an end
And some people say that that’s because
our relationship with God is eternal
and so it goes on and on
as does creation
God’s act of creation didn’t stop
all those years ago
but creation is always going on
in the rhythms that God first introduced to it
Evening, morning, day, night
summer, winter, spring and fall
every year it goes round and round
things come to life
are born and created
and things and people die
go back to the earth
and are re-created once again
and the cycle keeps going on and on
God is always creating

Look at you and me
What are we, the psalmist says,
that God is even mindful of us?
you think of the expanse of the universe
and why would God bother with us,
in comparison are just little specks?
But God is mindful of us,
God knows each of us by name
amidst the vastness of this ongoing creation
That’s pretty awesome, if you ask me
That God would even bother with the likes of me
when I’m just such a little part of the whole vast picture

I can’t tell you how the world was created
but I can tell you Who did it
and Who is still behind it every day

I like what a scholar wrote recently;
“A glass window stands before us. We raise our eyes and see the glass; we note its quality, and observe its defects; we speculate on its composition. Or we look straight through it on the great prospect of land and sea and sky beyond. So there are two ways of looking at the world. We may see the world and absorb ourselves in the wonders of nature. That is the scientific way. Or we may look right through the world and see God behind it. That is the religious way.
The scientific way of looking at the world is not wrong any more than the glass-manufacturer’s way of looking at the window. This way of looking at things has its very important uses. Nevertheless the window was placed there not to be looked at but to be looked through; and the world has failed of its purpose unless it too is looked through and the eye rests not on it but on its God….”

I like to tell people that I was born in the wrong place --
Right time, wrong place
When I go back to New Jersey,
I look around and I wonder what people look at
how they nourish their souls
I love Nebraska, you know that by now
I love the way you live with creation every day
The planting and the growing
the unpredictability of the weather
and it’s impact on the crops
The new birth of cattle or sheep or goats
Life and death
Life governed by rhythm of the seasons
I love being able to look at the vastness of the sky
when I drive here and there
Or looking at the weird behavior of birds
as they do their choreography in groups in the sky
or seeing the many different kinds of birds
seeing the cattle out in the field
the occasional llama or other different animal

Here in Nebraska, I can be in touch with God’s awesome creation
every day
My soul can be refreshed on the trip between here
and Kearney
or out in the boondocks of endless prairie
The smells of life and earth
of bovine excrement, even, reminds me that life is going on
all around me
and sometimes I can just take a moment
to see the beauty of God’s world
and how despite the things that break my heart
the world keeps going on
and the world will keep going on
season after season,
evening, morning, another day
And God looks upon it all, and says, “Wow, that’s pretty good.”

The seventh day never ends
There is a God-given reason for everything
and how it works
evening, morning, day
Work, rest, play
Inhale, exhale, the ebb and flow of God’s life in us
Even now, you are breathing in and out
without even thinking about it
God is constantly breathing life in you
In, out, in, out,
Night may come, and night may be long and dark
but as the psalmist says,
joy comes in the morning
because morning always comes
and brings us a new day
We dishonor God
when we ignore the gift of Sabbath
It’s built in to creation
Work, rest, work, rest

We are exhausted
spiritually, emotionally, physically and mentally
God knew from the beginning of time
that we need rest, Sabbath, restoration
or we die inside if not completely
Keeping Sabbath, taking time of rest as a part of your schedule
is a profound act of faith
Faith in the promise that we are all made in the image of God
equally,
we all bear that stamp upon us
it’s there already at birth,
we don’t earn it, we can’t lose it,
we are made in the image of God
Life is a gift,
life itself is grace
breathing in and out
can be a great symbol of taking in God’s spirit daily
even when we’re not thinking about it
because God longs to re-create us daily
feeding us, nourishing us,
sustaining us, until that time when evening comes
and we get to live forever
in God’s eternal Day…
Don’t miss the gift
don’t miss the beauty of life all around you
don’t miss the glory of God speaking to you
through the ongoing creation
God is very proud of creation
and the ongoing glory of it
despite the powers of death that always threaten
despite our human tendecies to want to destroy
instead of create
God says that it is good
all the God has created
It is good, it is very, very good...
Spend your life uncovering all that that means….