Creation

Since my being driven to Bible literacy a few years ago I've had the impulse to read the Genesis creation narratives anew. It's always good to see things with a fresh set goggles, but then I begin to worry that I'm going to launch out into territory in which I don't belong. I've made many shifts in thinking recently which I'm not completely comfortable with due to reactions I may receive from others who aren't ready to embrace what I've discovered. I'm not the type of person who likes to upset the applecart. I feel guilty when I do, and it would be all too easy to put all the apples back in the cart and forget the whole thing.

The church body in which I'm a member holds to a literal six-day creation as it is portrayed in Genesis 1. We believe in creation by divine fiat and creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing). In short, God commands something of tangible constituency to come into existence and it does! God said, “Let there be light!”, and there was light, particles and waves. The zenith occured when man and woman were created in the image of God. Of course, we have scientists and theologians from all of the disciplines who can demonstrate that all of this creating took place in a literal six-day period.

Some Christians believe that Genesis 1 describes a evolutionary process that endured for about 15 billion years, each “day” constituting an epoch of millions, or even billions, of years. Of course, these Christians also have scientists and theologians who can intelligently articulate this view, but then are met with disdain by the six-day folks, who will launch an effort to discredit the evolutionary view as “junk science”. Then the fighting begins, with each side strutting and posturing a supposed scientific superiority over the other side.

And then a guy like me comes along….

I'm of the mind that Genesis is not describing the creation of the physical universe, but is instead explaining the creation and origins of the nation of Israel using cosmic imagery. I don't have time to expand on this today. Suffice to say that it doesn't really matter to me how our universe and planet came into existence. I know that it's here with all of its marvel and magnificence, and that's good enough for me. I love looking at images from the Hubble telescope! What I'm more interested in is how God interacts with humanity and calls them to an awareness of being bearers of Spirit. And I believe it to be very significant when Pontius Pilate said of Jesus, “Ecce homo.” I'll elaborate on all of this some other time.