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Creations: Our Identities as Followers of Christ
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
2 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.
3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.
4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness.
5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day...
26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
I may have mentioned this to a few of you over the years, but to give a little background about myself for those who may not know me as well, I grew up in a diverse Protestant background. When I was young, I went to a Methodist church, then a non-denominational church, and all the while I was going to a Baptist school. What I find interesting looking back at those times - and there could be many reasons for what I am about to say, most of them due to my own faults - but it probably wasn’t until my late teens to early twenties that I can remember understanding that the stories in the Old Testament were actually much richer than I had realized, and that they happened and were revealed for good reason and according to God’s wisdom.
When I was a kid, I knew of events in the Old Testament like creation and the fall of Adam and Eve, Noah and the flood, Moses and Egypt, David and Goliath, and Daniel and the Lion’s Den. These and a few others were really popular in Sunday school. But we mostly read the stories of Jesus from the New Testament, and I just thought of Old Testament stories as completely separate from each other, almost like a random collection of stories that all just had common morale along the lines of, “You had better side with God if you want to turn out all right.”
Of course, that is a really important truth to know, especially for young children. But as I grew older, and especially after I started college, I began to hear others ask some hard questions about Christianity. I’m honestly grateful for that time, because I think it was God’s providence that led me to ask my own questions, by which His grace has caused me to grow in knowledge and assurance of His trustworthy promises.
All of that is a bit of a prelude to why I wanted to share some of my thoughts on the very beginnings of the Bible, one of those stories I mentioned that I was told as a kid but now realize has layers to it that always causes me to go back and appreciate the weightiness and freshness of God’s word and plan in history.
One of the hard questions I encountered was the idea of why God created things the way He did. I think we all know that God didn’t need to create, although there is nothing wrong with His decision to create since it pleased Him to do so. But given that He chose to create, I’ve had coworkers or friends ask me why I think God decided to create the way He did, because it seems He could have created many other ways. And while we could always just say, “well this is what pleased Him,” and on some level all questions of why God does what He does bottoms out with this answer, I think there is something else we can say to those people who ask us this.
For instance, a part of my answer to the question of why God created the way He did was that I think God was setting a pattern for imitation and life for the images of Himself that He knew that He would create: we men and women. Now obviously, we can’t create out of nothing, and we don’t have life in ourselves, but there are analogous actions and life we can have that mimic God’s, and I’ll mention a few of them shortly.
Before I do that, I want us to start by thinking about what creation itself is to God: what was the intention for creating the heavens and the earth in the beginning? And a reason I want to do that is that God Himself describes how He thinks of or treats His own creation of heaven and earth, so it will be useful to consider why God reveals these truths to us. So let’s turn to a few Scriptures:
In Isaiah 40:21-22, we read: Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in.Later, in Isaiah 66:1-2: Thus says the Lord: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest? All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the Lord.
Now, when I think about the house of the Lord in the Old Testament, I usually think about the temple, as that is the place where God dwelled among the Israelites. In 2 Samuel 7, for instance, the Lord communicates to the prophet Nathan His desire that a house be built for Him to dwell in, since He had been moving about in the tabernacle for His dwelling. Later, in 2 Chronicles 3:1, we see the fulfillment of God’s desire when the Chronicler writes, “Solomon began to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah.” This house refers to the temple that God’s glory filled once it was completed, just as His glory filled the completed tabernacle in Exodus 40. In other words, God moved into His house.
So we have an idea that creation is God’s house, and also an idea that the tabernacle and temple, at least in the Old Testament, were God’s house. Reverend Michael Morales, who I believe some of you know, wrote the following about this connection between creation in Genesis 1 and the tabernacle and temple:
Approaching the biblical account of creation, there are various indications that such a parallel between cosmos and temple (or tabernacle) is in view. For example, the Spirit or “Wind of God’ as a phrase appears in Genesis 1:2 for the construction of the cosmos and in Exodus 31:3 and 35:31 for the construction of the tabernacle. Moreover, the Spirit’s endowment of Bezalel, the chief artisan of the tabernacle, is described in terms of wisdom, understanding and knowledge (Exodus 31:3), the same attributes by which God is said to have fashioned the cosmos (Proverbs 3:19-20). Other creation terminology shared with the tabernacle includes the word light or lamp in Genesis 1:14-15, which always in the Pentateuch designates the lamps of the tabernacle...
Elsewhere in the Bible, creation is likened to a tent pitched by God (Psalm 104; Job 9:8, Isaiah 40:22) or to a house God has established, with pillars, windows and doors (Job 26:11; Genesis 7:11; Psalm 78:23)…” Reverend Morales concludes that “there is an analogical relationship between creation and tabernacle: again, the cosmos is a large temple; the temple is a small cosmos.
Indeed, as Psalm 78:69 says, “He built his sanctuary like the high heavens, like the earth, which he has founded forever.”
There are a lot of implications that we can draw from this connection between creation as God’s house and the temple as God’s house. I’ll just mention three things that I think we can learn from the first few verses of Genesis. The first is that God baptizes His house. The second is that the church is also considered God’s house. And the last is that as His house, we are to be lights in and of God’s house.
Baptism
The first point is that God baptizes His house. Let’s turn back to Genesis 1:2, where we see that the earth is formless, and the Spirit hovers over the face of the waters. Likewise, in Deuteronomy 32:10-11, several Reformed authors have noted that Moses uses the same relatively rare terminology to describe the Spirit as hovering like an eagle over the Israelites while leading them out of formless wilderness of Egypt (cf. Ezekiel 20:36) during the exodus. Paul later identifies this exodus through the Red Sea as a type of baptism (1 Corinthians 10:1-2). Similarly, a dove hovered over the flood in the time of Noah, and the Holy Spirit hovered in its descent as a dove on the Christ during His baptism. This leads Reformed author J. V. Fesko notes that “the origins of baptism lie in Genesis 1:2…” Thus, after creating His house, the first revealed act of the God is the baptism of His house. And as images of God and imitators of Christ, we too baptize our houses.
Only after God baptizes His house does He begins a process of newly creating it. He created the heavens and the earth as formless, void, and dark, but after baptism, we see God newly creating it in light, making divisions within His house, and then filling it. And this is why our baptism symbolizes us as new creations: because it recalls historical events in which God took His house and made it new.
Now, when we say that we should baptize our houses, we don’t actually mean our physical homes that we move into and physically dwell but rather our families. “House” is sometimes a double-entendre in Scripture – it can refer to a person’s dwelling place, or it can refer to his family – like when the Lord says in Hosea that He will have mercy on the house of Judah – and sometimes both a dwelling place and family are intended with just one word. There’s a good reason for this, and I will talk about that in a minute. But to give an example of what I mean, in 2 Samuel 7, the Lord reveals to David, “I will build you a house.” God was not only talking about the temple, the dwelling place of the Lord, but also the house of David, his family dynasty (2 Chronicles 21:7), including Solomon who we already noted built later built the temple-house of God.What does all of this lead to? My first point was that because God baptized His creation house in the beginning, we should too, and that our baptism symbolizes our being new creations just as God newly created His house after baptizing it. But this also leads into my second point: when we say God baptizes His house, we see that God baptizes – not only creation, not only the tabernacle, and not only the temple – but also His family (His Son and the church), too.
In other words, the second implication of creation being the Lord’s house is that as we too are baptized, new creations of God’s handiwork, that means we too are God’s house. And because we also are God’s house, we too are God’s dwelling place. I think this explains what I mentioned a moment earlier about why “house” in Scripture can sometimes refers to physical dwelling places, sometimes families, and sometimes both. As we live our lives analogically patterned after God’s life and actions, we can see that our dwelling is not only our physical place of existence but also our family. In God’s case, He not only intended to dwell in and enjoy Sabbath rest in His new creation in the sense of the cosmos but also in His images, us as new creations.
I believe this is why New Testament Scriptures explicitly reveal us to be temples for the Holy Spirit and houses of God, both individually and corporately as Christ’s body. I’ll note a few Scriptures:
2 Corinthians 6:15-20 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.” But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.
Ephesians 2:19-22 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
Hebrews 3:6 Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.
1 Corinthians 3:9-11, 16-17 For we are God's fellow workers. You are God's field, God's building. According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ… Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple.
2 Corinthians 5:1-4, 17 For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life... Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
I’ll briefly note that this last passage touches on eschatology. Peter writes in his epistle that all will be baptized by fire upon Christ’s return (1 Peter 1:7, 2 Peter 3:5-7), with some whose faith in Christ will be shown to be genuine and lead to a new and glorified life, and some whose unbelief leads to them and their sinful works being burned up in destruction. Likewise, Paul tells us to look forward to the return of Christ for new and glorified tent-bodies, if indeed we are new creations in Christ.
The final thing I will mention here is that not only are we houses and dwelling places for God as His new creation, but also, Christ is our new dwelling place. If we recall John 2, Christ mentioned that the temple of His body would be resurrected the third day after His crucifixion. We also may remember in Matthew 27 that the temple veil was torn when the temple of Christ’s body was crucified, enabling access for anyone who is united with Him to dwell, pray, and worship in the presence of the Father and heavenly hosts that are mentioned in Hebrews 12.
In other words, Christ is the true temple in that in Him dwells the fullness of the Father and Spirit, which is why He was able to reveal them to us. As Paul says, “he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.” So when the Spirit unites us to the Christ our Lord, a few things happen: we dwell in Christ, the true temple, and He then dwells in us, and we become temples. There is then a perichoresis or mutual indwelling of God in us and us in God that mimics the life of the Trinity, the source of all created life.
The third and last implication I want to draw out in the remaining time we have here is what we now are to do, knowing that we do that we are baptized new creations and the house of God. And to that point, let us return back to Genesis 1:
Genesis 1:2-5 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. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.
Think about what any of us do when we enter our houses. The first thing we do is to turn on the lights. We don’t stumble around blindly in darkness. Instead, we turn on the lights so we can see, evaluate, or judge the state of our house to make sure that everything inside set right. That’s exactly what God does here at the beginning of time. God, after baptizing His creation anew, says “Let there be light” and then evaluates His work as good, by which He then proceeds to continue to make covenantal divisions within His house, each of which He then covenantally fills, especially in multiplying His image.
Now for all we know, God could have created everything in light since the beginning, but He instead chose to create a formless and void creation in darkness. The Spirit then hovers over the face of the waters, baptizing it into the light of the word of God. Light is the means by which work is evaluated, which is why the first good work of God in newly creating His house is to turn on the light. This is also the beginning of a good work God will bring to completion at the day of the Lord, the Sabbath day. God Himself is the true light who came into a dark world to give it light, the true morning that follows the evening.
What we may not realize – or, at least, for I long time I didn’t realize – is that as we live the Christian life as we are supposed to do, we’re imitating a pattern God set since the beginning of time. Due to sin, we are born formless and void, creations in darkness (Ephesians 5:8). To make us new creations, the Spirit hovers over our faces, baptizing us into the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 4:6), who is the Word of God (John 1:1). Light is the means by which work is evaluated (John 3:19-21), which is why the first good work of God in newly creating us as His house (Hebrews 3:6) is also to turn on the light in it, and in His light we see and are light (Psalm 36:9). This is the beginning of a good work in us that God will also bring to completion at the day of Jesus Christ (Philippians 1:6), the one who gives us rest (Matthew 11:28). Christ is the true light who came into a dark world to give light (John 1:9), the true morning that follows the evening. He is the light by whom blind men are able to see (2 Corinthians 4:4), and in His light we will rest forever as we walk in it (Revelation 21:23-25). I won’t go through all of the Scriptures that support this comparison, but to name a few:
John 1:1-5, 9 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it… The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.
2 Corinthians 4:3-6 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
I think John ties all of the themes I have brought up in Revelation 21 in his description of the new heaven and new earth with its the holy city, the new Jerusalem. In this chapter, God declares He is making all things new, and that His dwelling place is with man. There will be no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.
All this is to say that what I’ve discovered is that the story in Genesis is the story of the rest of the Bible. It isn’t put there just because it is a record of the beginning of time, although it is that. As God brought forth light from darkness in Genesis, John 1 describes the Son of God as the life that is the light of all mankind, the true light gives light to everyone, the light that the darkness has not and will not overcome. This light exposes darkness, either converting it to light or judging it for trying to hide from it. To believers, God has given the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of the light. And having been enlightened, so to speak, we are to be lights in and to the world, means of witness by which the Father gives that light to others just as it was given to us:
Matthew 5:14-16 You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
Ephesians 5:8 at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light.
Being enlightened new creations by God’s handiwork, and we can know with assurance that God looks at and judges His work in us as good, just as He did in Genesis. That is our confidence that, as Paul says:
Philippians 1:6 I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
Following the heavenly pattern of God’s revealed actions and life is our impetus as new creations to live out godly lives on earth. Baptize our house, be God’s house, and shine as lights of His house so that we can, by God’s grace, reach those who are, like we were, in darkness. That is how we are a part of the answer to our prayer that the Father’s “will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” And with that, I will close with the following blessing from the apostle Paul from his letter to the Galatian church:
Galatians 6:15-16, 18 …neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen.
