Maker of Heaven and Earth

The third major thing that we confess about God in The Apostles' Creed is that he is our creator. "I believe in God the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth." Of course, one of the most well known verses in the Bible is Genesis 1:1, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."

There is much debate among Christians about the meaning of the opening chapters of Genesis and how God created the heavens and the earth. One web site lists nine different Christian viewpoints on this subject. (Nine Views of Creation) It seems to me that the purpose of the opening chapters of Genesis is to tell us the "who" of creation not "how". "In the beginning God created..." In order to understand the book of Genesis it is essential to understand its context and purpose.

The story is told by Stuart Briscoe about an old man in the deep South who was walking along a country road with his dog and his mule. A pickup truck came around the corner too fast and knocked the old man, his dog, and his mule into the ditch. Some time later, there was a court case where the old man claimed damages from the driver of the pickup truck. The counsel for the defence was cross-examining the old man and said, "Answer yes or not to this question: did you tell the defendant that you were okay?"

The old man answered, "My dog and my mule and me were coming..."

The defense attorney said, "Answer the question, yes or no. Did you tell the defendant you were okay?"

"Me and my dog and my mule..."

The attorney repeated, "Answer the question yes or no! Did you tell the defendant you were okay?"

The man replied, "Me and my..."

The counsel for the defense interrupted, turned to the judge and said, "Your honour, would you kindly instruct this man to answer the question yes or no?"

The judge said, "Let the man say what he is trying to say."

The old man said, "Me and my dog and my mule were coming 'round the bend, and this truck came around too fast and knocked us all into the ditch. And this man here jumped out of the cab. He had a gun, and he went to my dog. The dog was injured so he shot it. Then he went to the mule and saw that it had a broken leg so he shot the mule. Then he came and stood over me and asked, "How are you?" And I said, "I never felt better in my life!"

Context makes all the difference. We need to understand Genesis in context and let the text say what it is trying to say, rather than asking questions of the text that it was never written to answer.

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