Genesis 1

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1

This verse, the very first verse in the Bible speaks volumes concerning what it is that God intends for humankind to know about Himself. Although in a sense all that He reveals to us in the Bible is astounding and is shrouded in mystery, it nevertheless should cause us to reflect deeply on what it implies. This verse tells us that God created the heavens and the earth - all that we can see God brought into beginning. God's mode of creation was His spoken word. And God said. "Let there be light," and there was light. We have no idea how this could be. We have no idea how God could create something from nothing. Genesis one tells us that God created the earth and all the vegetation on it. He created the innumerable stars throughout the universe. His creation is beyond our grasp, we have no idea how big and how far it extends. Another amazing thing that the Bible tells us about God's creation is that the universe is constantly being upheld by God, actually it is the Son who is doing this, read Colossians 1:17, Hebrews 1:3. Without Christ holding existence up every creature including us would cease to be. (1) Acts 17:25, 28 says; "He gives to all mankind life and breath and everything...In him we live and move and have our being." In some of our earlier studies we spoke about what the world means as far as being an enemy of the Christian, a worldview that does not give God the honor he deserves and conducts itself as if there is no God, is what that term means. The fact that God is our Creator when weighted in the culturally realm has no significance and is even ridiculed as nonsense. That is what we mean when we say the world id the enemy of God and of the Christian, That mindset, that we all had at one time, that belief in God is immaterial. Only on the opposite side of regeneration are we privileged to see the deception of this mindset, and rightly understand what Satan is called the god of this world. This is the very reason why we should pray for those we know are not saved, on there way to hell, and may not even realize it. I am not saying that they don't know that what they are doing is wrong, I am only saying that their strongest inclination is always to go the way of the world, due to the evil in their own heart as well as the help from deception that Satan provides. When they Bible in the New Testament speaks about the world - this is what it is talking about. God's view is expressed in the very first words of the Bible. God is the Sovereign Creator, we owe our all to Him. Yet the world has forsaken God, People have forsaken God, God is the Creator and Sustainer of all that is, yet for the most part that creation does not want to have anything to do with Him. That is what sin has done. That is what cosmic deception looks like. Before we were saved we like those unsaved today believe that we are living a good life, one of the best things that we can do on a Sunday morning is go out for a jog, lay in bed and read a good novel with a good cup of coffee, and have no desire to worship God our Creator, and would be highly offended if someone would suggest that what I choose to do is in anyway offensive to anyone, I am living life well. But, the reality of it is you are being deceive right into hell. Pray for those that God has placed around you and pray for the strength to live a godly life before them, that God might sovereignty use you as the one that would speak a word of light into their darkness, and maybe begin the process of life, for them.

As we once again suffer through the evil of man's fallen state of sin, which is the cause of the horror of Newtown, Connecticut. Many may question the existence of God, when these horrible things happen. Why, if God is so good do we have these kinds of things happening? As I said God is shrouded in mystery and we do not understand everything that happens, we are unable to understand Him completely, we do not always have a clear answer. God has not promised us a life without pain and suffering and evil, in this life, and the reason for that is sin. I can only say that maybe God always wants us to understand the true horror of our sin and what the only outcome that it can bring is utter evil. We can take hope from the fact that God has promised to bring it to an end. Evil will not continue it has a end, Satan has an end, our own sin has an end. One thing that evil does is that it makes us pray. So, prayer for Newtown as they try to live through this horror. In the aftermath, pray that God will shine forth as the great Comforter that He is.The God that is the Creator will have His purposes prevail. We have His Word which promises it. We should pray for the families of these who have experienced this great terror, we should pray for this nation.

God's image is in man, and with man we mean humankind. Although sin has marred that image it still remains in each human being. We were created to reflect God in though and action, that's why we were created in His image. The Reformation Study Bible says that that image consists in : (1) existence as a "soul" or spirit" as personal and self-conscious, with a God-like capacity for knowledge, thought, and action, (2) being morally upright, a quality lost at the Fall but now being progressively restored in Christ (Eph. 4:24, Col. 3:10), (3) dominion over the environment, (4) the human body as the means through which we experience reality, express ourselves, and exercise dominion, and (5) the God-given capacity for eternal life. But because we are now slaves to sin, we are unable to mirror God's holiness. Regeneration begins the process of restoring God's moral image in our lives. But not until we are fully sanctified and glorified shall we reflect God perfectly in thought and action as we were mad to do and as Jesus Christ actually did.

This should cause us to reflect on the graveness of sin and what it has done to each one of us, to our relationship with each other and more importantly to our relationship with the God who created us for godly interaction with Himself.

(1) Reformation Study Bible, English Standard Version, Ligonier Ministries