Observing the Beginning

 I'm working on some VBS lessons out of the first couple chapters of Genesis, and I was struck once again by Genesis 1:1-2,

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. 

Here are three quick things I noticed in this passage today.


God Created

This is the most obvious point. It's also the most important. The opening pages of the Bible assume the existence of an eternal Creator (present before the beginning, because he initiates said beginning). They also assume that everything else is derivative from, and dependent upon, him. This assumption frames the whole Bible; nothing makes sense without a Creator who transcends, who exists apart from and independent of, this world.


God Formed

I've always found it curious that God didn't just create everything in one big shot. He's speaking it all into being ex nihilio, why this pattern of days that we see? 

But one of the interesting things about this, which we read in v2, is that while this earth is formless and void, the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. So while the previous verse introduced us to the transcendent Creator, here we meet the intimate Former of creation. God exists outside of creation, yes. He also personally at work within it.


No Date Stamp

Much to the consternation of people from every side of this question, the Bible doesn't tell us when God made the heavens and the earth. Well, it does: in the beginning. We just don't have a date for that beginning. And I think that's just fine.

I personally find a young earth argument to be the most reasonable based upon Biblical evidence, particularly in how the doctrine of sin develops. But I can look someone of a more Frances Collins persuasion right in the eye, shake their hand, and agree that we hold the central truth of this passage in common, God created. He rules. He is to be worshiped. Whenever he did this marvelous making of heavens and earth.

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