B'reishit Bara Elohim (Genesis #4)

What is the first line of your favorite book?  Can you recall?

Moby Dick:  "My name is Ishmael."
A Wrinkle in Time:  "It was a dark and stormy night."
A Tale of Two Cities:  "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."

English nerds say the opening lines are of utmost importance, and I agree.  We are going to examine the opening words of Genesis 1 which, of course, are also the opening words of the greatest book ever written.

The title of today's post is an English transliteration of the Hebrew for "In the beginning God created".

At those simple words the secular world flips out.  Game on.  God inserts Himself into the consciousness of mankind by declaring He is responsible for starting it all.

Let's begin with the word, Elohim.  Elohim is a plural word. One of the names for God, it represents the Trinity:  Father, Son and Holy Spirit, all of whom were present at "the beginning" during the creation of the universe, of all that IS.

1In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God, and the Word was God.

2He was with God in the beginning.

3All things were made through Him, and apart from Him nothing was made that has come into being.

4In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.  

John 1:1-4 TLV

So, there is Jesus (Ben Elohim), the Son, the Logos, the Person of the Godhead who made all things.  He is called by John "the Word", because He spoke all things into existence.  In addition to John's testimony, we have Paul's as well in Colossians 1:15-17 (TLV) - - -

15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

16For by Him all things were created— in heaven and on earth, the seen and the unseen, whether thrones or angelic powers or rulers or authorities. All was created through Him and for Him.

17He exists before everything, and in Him all holds together.

We find the Holy Spirit in Genesis 1:2, where He is called in Hebrew the Ruach Elohim (Spirit of God).

So, Elohim - - Father, Son, Holy Spirit - - Three-in-One, holy perfection!

Elsewhere in Genesis, God gives us a glimpse into the interactions of the Trinity, when He reveals conversations the three Persons had with each other.  The clue is the word "us".

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness! 

Genesis 1:26a (TLV)

Then Adonai Elohim said, "Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil."

Genesis 3:22a (TLV)

And then, at the Tower of Babel . . . 

Come! Let Us go down and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand each other’s language.”

Genesis 11:7 (TLV)

Here are other passages in scripture where the word "Creator"/"Maker" would be more accurately translated  "Creators"/Makers:  Ecclesiastes 12:1, Isaiah 54:5 and Deuteronomy 6:4.  You may recognize that last scripture reference as The Shema, which Jews recite as the bedrock foundation of their faith.  They do so to affirm the "one-and-onlyness" of Jehovah.  But, this is quite curious... Here is the entire Shema from the Tree of Life version, a Messianic Jewish translation, publ. 2014:

Shema Israel, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad

4“Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one .

5Love Adonai your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

6These words, which I am commanding you today, are to be on your heart.

7You are to teach them diligently to your children, and speak of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down and when you rise up.

8Bind them as a sign on your hand, they are to be as frontlets between your eyes,

9and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Deuteronomy 6:4 (TLV)

When examining the Hebrew of this verse, it appears that a wrong word was used for "one".  The word God used here is from the Hebrew root "echad", which means "to collect", "to unify", a "united one".  A more appropriate Hebrew word, to signify "one, and only one God", would have been the Hebrew "yachiyd".  But, that is not the word God inspired Moses to use.   This has troubled many orthodox Jewish rabbis over the centuries.  Some of them, in fact, have called this a scribal error! Smh... no error!  Rather, it is a testimony to the Triunity of Adonai Elohim!

One of my favorite hymns is "Holy, Holy, Holy".  It was written, based on the spoken testimony of praise given by the angelic beings called seraphim, who surround the throne of God and call out night and day "Holy, Holy, Holy is the LORD of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!" (Isaiah 6:3)
Ever wonder why Isaiah witnessed them crying out "Holy" three times in succession like that?  Could they be praising each holy Person of the Triune God?  It would seem so.

Here's another mystery, though, as if the Trinity were not mystery enough.

"Bara" ("created and keeps on creating") is a singular verb, occurring 46 times as a verb in the Old Testament.  When seen in scripture this verb is always found with God as its subject, implying only God can "bara".  Would you not expect a plural verb, for the three Persons of the Godhead?  But no!  We worship One God, who makes it apparent from the opening words of His book that He is a plural being.  Hallelujah!  "Bara" is singular, because it conveys the Oneness, the perfect unity of the only true God.  Furthermore, and this is amazing also - - every time Elohim is used as God's name in scripture, it is paired with a singular verb.  In other words, the pairing is grammatically incorrect, although it is spiritually correct!
It is assumed by many evangelicals that Elohim created "creation" out of nothing.  But, implicit in the word "bara" is an opening up, a filling up, more like populating or bringing into tangible existence.  "Populating from what or where?", you might ask, and rightly so.  From Elohim, of course, from the Everlasting One, from The Alpha and the Omega (The First and the Last), who SPOKE the worlds into existence (again, the Word, John 1:1-4).  We see this use of the word "bara" in 1 Samuel 2:29.  The phrase "making yourselves fat" or "fattening yourselves" (depending on the translation you are using) is lə·haḇ·rî·’ă·ḵem, related to "bara".  (See biblehub.com reference.)

So, we see that God (Adonai Elohim) opened Himself and spoke all creation into existence, both seen and unseen.  To believe otherwise contradicts the laws (not the theories) of Science as well as the nature of the (3) Creator(s).

Astounding.  Incomprehensible.  Stunning.

In the next post....b'reishit.

Sources:

http://xwalk.ca/elohim.html

https://www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/hebrew/nas/bara.html

https://zondervanacademic.com/blog/we-have-been-di/

http://www.wildbranch.org/teachings/word-studies/55bara.html

http://biblehub.com/hebrew/bara_1254.htm

Garden of Life

I was over at a friend's house yesterday, after not having been to her home before, and noticed that she has beautiful box gardens out in the front of her home.  I had to fight "the envy response", and told her so.  Here we are in the middle of winter, and there was still lovely produce in her beds.  In our neck of the woods, you can grow various foods outside, 10 months out of the year, if you work at it.  This is what hit my mind as I read today's text, because Paul uses the gardening metaphor in
Galatians 6:6-10.  Let's sow precious seed into our souls this morning as we examine this text.

6 Be very sure now, you who have been trained to a self-sufficient maturity, that you enter into a generous common life with those who have trained you, sharing all the good things that you have and experience.

7-8 Don’t be misled: No one makes a fool of God. What a person plants, he will harvest. The person who plants selfishness, ignoring the needs of others—ignoring God!—harvests a crop of weeds. All he’ll have to show for his life is weeds! But the one who plants in response to God, letting God’s Spirit do the growth work in him, harvests a crop of real life, eternal life.

9-10 So let’s not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop if we don’t give up, or quit. Right now, therefore, every time we get the chance, let us work for the benefit of all, starting with the people closest to us in the community of faith.

The Message version

The overarching themes of this passage are generosity and focus, because they are intertwined.
The first key question is:  how are you spending your time?  I want you to really think about that this morning.

I had occasion to really think about this deeply over the past couple of days, while you didn't get a post here at the RD blog.  I was under a heavy workload, from my two contracted jobs.  Plus, another opportunity crossed my path, which I'm praying about.  These circumstances have "moved my cheese", as the book1 says, causing me to ask: "How am I spending my life? Am I planting selfishness, which will produce a crop of weeds?"  It's an important question, no matter one's age - - - young, middle-aged, or well-seasoned.

One translation of 6:7 says, "Don't be deceived.  God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap."  It's a principle of God's order.  If you plant pumpkin seeds, you'll harvest pumpkins, not half-runner pole beans.  If you plant strawberries, you'll not harvest corn.  The same is true with our lives.  God gives each one of us the tools we need for this life, and only asks that we use them to follow Him.  Yet, He leaves the choice of whether we use our tools, how we use them, when we use them and for whose glory we use them - -  up to us.

I'll tell you this, fellow believers.  I pray I've chosen well, and that I continue to choose well for the remainder of my earthly days, no matter how many of them are left.

Young people have a lot of angst about "what to do with my life".  I remember that stage, and it IS difficult.  Here's my advice.  Look at the gifts God has given you.  If you stink at writing and hate it, don't choose a career that requires skill at writing, for example.  Is there something you love to do? Find a creative way to make a career of it, as long as it brings glory to God.  And, then, throughout your life, look for open doors.  God will lead you, if you seek, trust and obey Him.  Don't be afraid to walk through them.  One of my university professors used to say (borrowing from A.W. Tozer), "There's no difference between the secular and the sacred"1, which means that for the Christian following Jesus Christ and seeking to honor Him, all is "sacred".  All God-inspired work is holy work.  When we are submissive to Him, His Holy Spirit "does a growth work" in us, producing in and through us a harvest of "real life", "eternal life"!

Now, for the other side of this equation: generosity.  I've had the t.v. on "mute" as I've been blogging this morning, but I just dialed up the sound.  There's a news story on, about a "chain" of people who got out of their cars on a snowy interstate highway to heroically rescue a man, trapped in the cab of an 18-wheeler, hanging over a precipice.   It was generosity that prompted them to do that.  What if they had just left him hanging there?  What if they had made excuses - - - "It's too dangerous!  I might be hurt or killed myself!"

And similarly, Christian, when all around us lost people are headed to Hell at warp speed....what is our response?  How much more should we generously extend a hand, using the gifts we've been given, to rescue them?

Unfortunately, the culture of American society is often this:  to get as many goodies for myself as I possibly can, whether I earned them or not, and then to spend my time indulging my every desire. The biblical word/phrase for this is "worldliness" or "the lust of the eyes".

15Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life^c—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.  

1 John 2:15-16 (ESV)

God, by contrast, commands us to be generous people, starting with lavishly supporting those who have "raised us up" in the Christian faith.  Preachers hesitate to preach on this verse, because it sounds self-serving.  But, the truth is - - - we should generously compensate our church leaders for the very valuable work they do.  Sure!  There are excesses!  Some very "successful", well-known religious leaders have used their money to purchase solid gold bath fixtures in their homes or multi-million dollar jets (or tried to).  In general, though, pastors and missionaries and Bible professors and so on are not rich in material goods.  They should be some of the most financially well-off among us! I don't think that it is an accident Paul emphasizes that we should share our financial blessings with those who are making it their life's work to spread the gospel or equip believers.

Even beyond that, we should live lives of generosity, sharing the riches (both material and spiritual) God has given us with those around us. This is love.  Love is not stingy.  You can't love another person (especially God), while at the same time being stingy with your treasures.  That is why God gave us The Shema2.

There are so many fabulous Bible verses I could share here, but won't, for the sake of time.  (Mother tells me my posts just run on and on...).  But, under Sources: I will post a link, where you can click and read many such verses3.

Lord God, Giver of all precious blessings, You open Your hand so generously to us!  Cover our tightly-closed fists, our locked-up hearts and open them.  Break them open so that we can lavish love on those around us. For Jesus' glory and in His name, amen.

Sources:

1.  Johnson, Spencer. Who Moved My Cheese?: An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life. New York: Putnam, 1998. Print.
2.  http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/tozer/5f00.0888/5f00.0888.10.htm
3.  Deuteronomy 6:4; Luke 10:27
4.  https://www.openbible.info/topics/generosity