Creation of the Earth

The Need For Light and Life

1 IN the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.(Genesis 1:1)

The God of the creation of the earth was no other than Jesus. How could that be possible, seeing that he was not born for many thousand years yet? Would it surprise you to hear that before Jesus was born, he lived as a God in his Fathers presence? Well, he did!

Jesus lived in the courts of God the Father, the supreme ruler of the universe. There Jesus was known as the pre-mortal God Jehovah. God; who was the father of Jesus (Jehovah) even in that world of spirits; saw the goodness and perfection of his son, Jehovah, and gave him command over all his spirit children, and the subsequent creation of the earth for them. You and I were there too.

The Creation of the Earth. On the earth, at the time of Jesus, the Jews were forbidden to use the name Jehovah lightly. So, in talking of him, they would use other terms to signify the creator of the world, the God of Abraham, etc. One of these terms was: “The Word”.

1 IN the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

2 The same was in the beginning with God.

3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:1-3)

        2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. (Genesis 1:2)

If the earth was without form it was neither round nor flat. It wasn’t even square or lumpy, for all these things are descriptions of different forms. It is also described as being void, meaning empty. In other words;

At the time called "the beginning" the earth was not created yet! If it would have been created, it would have had a form, and it could certainly not have been empty! And darkness was upon the face of the deep. In other words; in the three dimensions in which the heaven and earth was going to be placed, there was darkness. We will return to that later. First we have to look at this statement:

“And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters”. What would the purpose of God be to move upon the face of the waters? God never does anything without a reason or purpose. And another question; where would such a surface of water be, if there is no earth created yet? It is not likely that a body of water, with a surface, would float around in space. Time to turn to the original texts. And in the Hebrew we find that the Spirit of God could have been translated to:” the mind of God”, or “the thoughts of God”. A perfectly good translation of the Hebrew could have been: “And the thoughts of God were upon the waters”, or as we should have said it today: “And God planned how to solve the water-issue”. Remember that this is only a hypothesis, at this stage, but wait, we shall see if the hypothesis holds water (no pun intended).

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. Genesis 1:3

Do you recall that I promised that we would return to the darkness upon the face of the deep? It’s time for that now! You do remember that “God” in the creation of the earth is Jesus? This is important at this stage, because what happened in verse three is quite amazing!

If you look in verse five you will see that when Jehovah said: “Let there be light” it was the first day of the creation of the earth and the universe. But it was in the fourth day that he created the sun, the moon and the stars, to give light to the earth!

14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:

15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.

16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.

17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,

18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.

19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. (Genesis 1:14-19)

So that which happened on the first day of the creation of the earth was something totally different than creating light for our eyes to see. And now it gets exciting! Let us turn to St John again;

4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.

8 He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.

9 That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. (John 1:4-9)

…And darkness was upon the face of the deep… In other words, what was missing in “the deep” was something called “light”.

Before Jesus appeared to the scene there was no life in any of the matter of the vast deep to become the universe. In John 1:4 we read that “the life was the light of men”. And so it was with the deep; if there was no life in the deep, there was no light. And the first thing that had to happen in the creation of the earth was to make sure that there were life in all matter, for how could dead matter obey the call of Jehovah?

So before Jesus gave any commandments to any matter in universe, he had to fill all that matter with life, or light, for they are synonymous, or at least inseparable. So, when Jesus gave life/light to all matter of the deep (the universe), why didn’t the darkness comprehend it( V.5)? Because darkness has no life! Every man is built of the matter that is given light by Jesus. So the light of Christ is in all of us.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. (Genesis 1: 4-5)

What is this day and night, then, if the light of the first day is the light of Christ, giving life to everything in universe? There is a day of creation for everything, but it is not at the same time. God does everything in perfect order. We, our world, our universe exists in the day of creation. Everything that awaits its turn to enroll in such a grand master-plan, is right now in the night of no creation. And as far as matter goes, it doesn’t make any difference, since it has no light, life, and comprehend it not.

6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

Now, there is a day of creation, in which all matter has life and light, and therefore will obey his voice. Jehovah/Jesus immediately uses this by making his first commandment to matter. And this is exciting again! Do you remember the hypothesis that God was planning to solve the water issue, before any other creation took place? Well, of course that makes sense, since everything living would die without it. But look at the beautiful way he solves the problem:

Jehovah had all the matter present. Every chemical imaginable, water included, but it was spread out in clouds of ice, or mists or whatever. Now, see what Jehovah does. He commands a solid earth to be formed (let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters). What happened when Jesus caused a huge ball of rock to form? Yep! You’re right! Gravity happened! And as gravity happened, waters started to fall down on the earth to create the big seas. Let’s look at the commandment again. I will make some changes, and you will see how great this is!

And God said, Let their be a planet in the midst of the waters of the atmosphere that will attract the water, so there will be some water on the actual planet, and some water in the sky above.

You see, there must be two waters, one on the earth for all living organisms, and one in the atmosphere to cool the earth and protect it from the sun, and to refill the water-sources with clean, sweet water as the old evaporates. Further; the Hebrews had two firmaments as well. One was the earth, obviously, and the other was the sky, that they saw as a firm. It is important to know in order to understand verses seven and eight.

7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day. (Genesis 1:7-8)

Verses seven and eight should be understood:

7 And God made the earth, which divided the waters which were under the heaven from the waters which were above the earth: and it was so.

8 And God called one of the firmaments Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

This page has only looked at two days of the creation of the earth and of the universe. Believe me, there is a lot more exciting stuff to learn about the glorious work of Jesus – the Creator.

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