Please take your Bibles and please turn with me to the very first chapter. So it's not going to be difficult to find. Genesis chapter one. We're going to read the whole thing. Genesis chapter one, the whole chapter, just really to get a sense of all of the things that God made that first week of creation. Genesis chapter 1, reading from the first verse. This is God's word. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, let there be light. And there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day and the darkness he called night. And there was evening and there was morning the first day. And God said, let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters and let it separate the waters from the waters. And God made the expanse, and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse. And it was so. And God called the expanse heaven. And there was evening, and there was morning the second day. And God said, let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear. And it was so. God called the dry land earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called seas. And God saw that it was good. And God said, let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind on the earth. And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning the third day. And God said, let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years. And let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth. And it was so. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night. and the stars. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning the fourth day. And God said, let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens. So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves with which the waters swarm according to their kinds and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them saying, be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas and let birds multiply on the earth. And there was evening, and there was morning, the fifth day. And God said, let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds, livestock and creeping things, and beasts of the earth according to their kinds. And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth. And God said, Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit, you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the heavens, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food. And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning, the sixth day. Amen, may God bless to us this reading, and also the preaching of his own perfect and powerful word. Please do have your Bibles open at Genesis chapter one. as we spend a few minutes just looking at this chapter together. I want to start by reading you a piece from a book. You may recognise these words but I want you to imagine that you are actually there as you hear these words, that you are part of all of this. Try to picture what it is that you hear. In the darkness, something was happening. A voice had begun to sing. Beginning very far away and growing gradually stronger, sometimes it seemed to come from all directions at once. It was quite simply the most beautiful sound you could ever wish to hear. In the distance, down near the horizon, the sky began to turn grey. A light wind, very fresh, began to stir. The sky in that one place grew slowly and steadily paler. You could see shapes of hills standing up dark against it. The eastern sky changed from white to pink and from pink to gold. The voice rose and rose till all the air was shaking with it. And just as it swelled to the mightiest and most glorious sound it had yet produced, the sun arose. You could imagine that it laughed for joy. as it came up. The earth on which it shone was of many colors. They were fresh, hot, and vivid. They made you feel excited until you saw the singer himself, and then you forgot everything else. That's actually C.S. Lewis. describing the creation of Narnia, how Narnia began. But it's very similar to what we have in Genesis 1. Do his words excite you? Do his words move you? The first shafts of light slicing through the blackness. Great land masses rising up out of the oceans. the hills and the valleys quivering and bubbling as trees and shrubs and animals burst through to the light. I think we sometimes read the opening words of the Bible more like a phone book, as if we still do have such things, or a shopping list, rather than the very words of our creator. We need to read this chapter with a sense of awe and wonder, a sense of worship. Massive cosmic events are being described, the forming and the fashioning of the universe. This past week, sad to say, we have seen the sudden mayhem that flash floods can cause in the country of Spain. Have you ever felt an earthquake? Have you ever seen a landslide? Have you ever been caught in a torrential downpour? These are just small potatoes compared to what we have here. And those things are mostly destructive. This is constructive. All designed to make something pure and perfect. but all told in simple language so that even a child can understand. These must be God's words. These are the first words of the greatest story ever told. And every line is true. Genesis chapter one and Genesis chapter two, they tell us how the world was formed. One speaker talks about God's blueprints which he is laying out here. God is giving Moses these words. Possibly Moses is maybe even relying on something that Adam had written down. This is how the world works. Lose the blueprints and the world makes far less sense. In this service, I want us to get a wide angle view of the whole thing as Moses paints it for us. And then this evening, God willing, I want to home in on the human world as Moses does in Genesis chapter two. I sad to say, things are not the same now as they were at the start. Something has spoiled God's perfect creation. But if we don't get a handle on how things were at the start, we won't grasp what has gone wrong or how it can be put right. These are the foundation chapters of the Bible. And this can be seen most clearly with the Hebrew Bible. And this is an illustration I have used in class. This is a Hebrew Bible. I'll just let you see. That's Hebrew in the middle of it. And this is the normal way that you would take a book. But if you look, you can see the title for the Hebrew Bible is on the wrong side. It should be on that side, but it's on that side. So you actually set the book down like that. Where's the book of Genesis? The book of Genesis is at the back. It starts from the right hand side and you read to the left. You start from the back of the book and you work towards the front. So, if I set this book down like that, it's actually resting on Genesis chapter one. That's how we can say that these first few chapters of Genesis are the foundation. And this is also why the world at large Many unbelievers have focused their attacks on these opening chapters of Genesis. If you can destroy the foundation, the rest of the building isn't going to survive. In recent years, things that we never thought were up for grabs, like gender and identity. These things have been questioned and these are things that we're told about from these very early chapters. That's why you and I need to understand what God says here. We need to hold on to it and we need to share it with others because no other foundation apart from the one that God has given us, will do. If you're able to read Genesis chapter two before this evening, then please do so. That will help you greatly when you come this evening. And please pray for the preaching of God's word. I do thank those who've been praying this week for this service. Please pray for this evening's service as well. God wants to bless us as we study his word. But the enemy of our souls wants no such thing. And he is a frequent visitor to services like this. So pray against him too. These opening chapters of Genesis make sense of the world we live in. Whenever people today are confused and lost and frightened. So let's get a flavour of chapter one. I just want to call the sermon today, God and the World He Made. God and the World He Made. We need to look at the first paragraph first, and then we'll look at the chapter as a whole, and we'll finish by thinking why we have this chapter. So first of all, let's look at what occupies first place in this chapter. What you could call the great person in this chapter. In the beginning, God. God occupies first place in this chapter in the whole book. If you read the whole of Genesis chapter one, you'll find God's name 30 times. God is the great reality. He is the key to everything. He was there in the absolute beginning. Before there was ever one particle of matter, before there was ever one second of time, before there was ever one ounce of space, He was there. He made all. He holds all in place. And that includes you and me. And you'll see as you would read through the book of Genesis how many times there are lists of names and family trees. But we don't have one for God. God doesn't have any ancestors. God doesn't have any beginning. He's always been there and he will always be there. But amazingly, he was not alone. Some people think God made the universe because he was lonely. But look again at the first three verses of the chapter. We have God in verse one. We have the spirit of God in verse two. And how does God create in verse three? And God said, let there be light. He creates by speaking. The apostle John tells us, in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. Someone who is God himself, someone who was with God before the beginning, Someone who is called what he's called because of his speaking. Someone who reveals God's mind to us. That's how we reveal ourselves to other people, by speaking to them, by talking. So we have Father, Spirit, and Word existing from eternity. It's well said that before the Father had a sin, to hate, he had a son to love. And those three persons of the Trinity were related to each other, they loved each other, they spoke to each other, they planned together before they created together. So family members, if you're related to each other, husbands and wives, if you love each other, Friends, if you speak to each other, if you make plans together, then you're doing things that go back to before the world began. One more thing about God, the center of the universe, before we move on. Did you notice Genesis chapter one doesn't try to prove God's existence? Instead, the Bible writers just assume that God exists, and they work from there. You may meet people, maybe at school, maybe in your work, and they'll say to you, prove to me that God exists, and then I'll believe in him. Don't be panicked whenever you hear a challenge like that. I hope you're not saying that yourself today. because God can't be proved. It's foolish even to try. Can we put God in some kind of a test tube so that we can analyse him, so that we can satisfy our curiosity? Can we sit in judgement on God? Surely it's the other way round. God will judge us. And this book calls us from the very first verse to lay aside our pride, to bow humbly before God, as the Psalms we've been singing would encourage us to do. We can't prove him, but we can know him. Can a fish prove the existence of the water it's swimming in? It can't, but it can't live without that water. We can't live without God. Deep down in your heart, because of the way you're made, you know that God exists. Do you admit that? I would imagine the fact that you're in church today would indicate that. Are you bowing down and worshipping this great, unique person? So the great person in this chapter, God, before all, creator of all, beyond all. He's not part of this world. He exists beyond this world. So he can't be corrupted or infected by this world. Secondly, let's look at the pattern of the chapter. The person in the chapter, the pattern of the chapter. God creates by speaking. That shows immense power. Kings, presidents say the word and it's done. God is more powerful than any king. He creates out of nothing. All other craftsmen need raw materials. God? No. Now, there are many other creation stories around the world in many other cultures, but not one of them talks about creation out of nothing. This is unique to the Bible. It's quite incredible. But elsewhere, the Bible tells us it is so. By faith, the writer to the Hebrew says, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. That doesn't just show God's power. That shows his sovereign rights. If he has made something like this, he controls it. And he is entitled to unmake it again if he chooses. Do you see how organised it all is? Apart from the fact that we're told day by day what happens. I think that's the important framework for the chapter. But we're told in verse 2 that the earth was without form and void. Empty. It doesn't mean that there was anything harmful or sinful about it. It was just maybe like a pile of clay that hadn't been formed or shaped yet. On the first day, God creates the light. The earth is taking form. On the second day, he creates the waters, the waters that sit above the earth and the vast oceans on the earth with the sky in between. And then on the third day, he creates the dry land, bursting with plants and trees. So verse two says the earth was formless, but in three days, God has given it form. And then days four, five, and six, God sets about filling the forms that he's created. On day four, from verse 14 on, we return to the light, the light from day one. God fills up the light by creating the light bearers, the sun for the day and the moon for the night, although the word sun and the word moon aren't used. We'll come back to that in a little while. Look at verse 14. And God said, let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night and let them be for signs and for seasons, for days and for years. What an amazing thing that God makes all these bodies in space to help us here on earth with our calendar, with our seasons, with our days. and years. Then on day five, we're back with the waters and the sky. That's starting in verse 20. And God fills these forms that he has created. The waters, the goldfish to the blue whale. The skies from the golden eagle to the hummingbird. And on the sixth day, we come back to what was formed on the third day. We come back to the land, and now God fills the land. He fills the land with all kinds of animals, great and small, including, and I'm sure boys and girls would like to hear about this, including dinosaurs. That's when the dinosaurs were made. and they were made by God. I actually have another tie with dinosaurs on it and a Bible verse on it because this is when God makes the dinosaurs. And I have a book here. It's quite a fancy book. It's basically telling us that there are all kinds of pictures, all kinds of art in different parts of the world of different kinds of dinosaurs. In other words, people have seen dinosaurs. And they have painted what they have seen. And there's some comparisons made here so that you can actually see the kind of dinosaurs that they were actually painting. So the dinosaurs didn't live millions of years before human beings, but at the same time. In fact, there might be some dinosaurs still alive today. I'm still alive. And now it's time for God's master stroke, the creation of man. One to know God, one to govern his world. Look at verse 26. Then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So first of all, God gives form and brings order. And then he brings fullness, richness, Abundance. God is the God of life. It's Satan who wants to corrupt that life. Satan is not God's equal. Satan is a created being. Now, you may have questions about these verses. Let me just mention three questions. What about these days in Genesis? There's major debate right across the world about the days of Genesis 1. Were these days 24 hour long days? The word that's used for day here, it's used in different ways, even in this chapter. It's used many, many times through the Bible. But generally the word that's used here is used for ordinary days. People who want it to mean something else. And sad to say, many preachers in America, I think, have fallen down here. People who want it to mean something else other than 24-hour days. I think there's some kind of hidden agenda. Another question that comes into the whole question of the days. Well, how can you have ordinary days if the sun isn't made till the fourth day? How can you have a solar day before the sun? Sensible question. How can you have light? How can you have day and night without the sun? Well, it sounds from what we have in verse 5, in verse 8 and in verse 13. It sounds as if there's evening and there's morning. There's something revolving before the sun is even created. Is the sun all powerful? Or is God all powerful? There'll be no need for the sun in heaven. The glory of God and of the Lamb will provide the light. So I don't think that the sun being created on the fourth day means that we can't have literal days for the whole week. Well what about evolution? That's far too big a question to answer in a couple of sentences. But let me just say that many people who favour evolution, not everyone, but many people who favour it do so against overwhelming evidence because they don't like God. For many, it's a question of belief. It's not a question of science. And what we have here at the dawn of time is not a big buying. It's a big God. The big bang is coming. Whenever Jesus returns. This chapter, Genesis chapter one, isn't written to satisfy your curiosity. It's not written to solve all the puzzles, all the questions you may have in your mind. It's written to bring you to your knees. in wonder, in love, in praise. God could have made the universe like that. In fact, one of the early church fathers believed that he did. Such was his power. But there's a reason why he takes six days. He intended to set us a pattern. One day of rest in every seven is God's pattern for his people. God willing, we'll come back a little bit to this this evening. But on that, the end of the sixth day, before the seventh day arrives, God stands back from his work and he pronounces his verdict. He says, it is very good. the material world in all its richness, each individual that he has made, family life with Adam and Eve, all very good. So God wants us to take time every week to rest and to consider what he has made, not to idolise the world, but to marvel at our maker, and to worship him. Did you ever think that Adam's and Eve's first full day on this planet was a Sabbath day? In Genesis 1 we see God's pattern. He brings order, he brings fullness to his creation. Can his pattern be seen in your life? Has he brought order out of the disorder of your sin? Has he brought fullness and richness out of the emptiness, out of the upside downness of your life? So the great person in this chapter, God, first and last, the pattern of the chapter, God's perfect design. Thirdly, let's just ask, what's the purpose of this chapter? What's it here for? That's always a good question to ask of any Bible passage. Let me just give you three simple reasons, and we've really talked about the first of them already. This chapter is to show us the greatness of God. A God who is powerful, who is loving, who is totally in control. A second purpose has to do with the dignity of man. And again we look at this further this evening. It's enough here to say that man is the crown of creation. And when I say man, if you look at verse 27, I mean what verse 27 says. Man is male and female. And in verses 26 and 28, God gives man, male and female, dominion over the world. The lion is the king of the jungle. The dolphin apparently has a bigger brain than we do. But lions and dolphins don't run this world. Every single person in the world is made in the image of God. Without man, without human beings, the world would be like a richly furnished house without an owner. Man has been abused and misused, maybe this past century more than any other time, through war and violence and revolution. But Genesis chapter one tells us the world was made for us. When you go on holiday and see a breathtaking mountain range, or when you look up into the vastness of the night sky, say to yourself, God made these things for me. If I'm God's child, Now this world is passing away, but God has set eternity in the heart of man. For you will not be eternity with him, or eternity on your own. So the greatness of God, the dignity of man, and Genesis 1 also shows us the richness of the world. What abundance, what variety there is here. For all they're searching. They haven't found intelligent life anywhere else in the universe. This world is teeming with it. This past while we've had mild, settled weather. Go out for a walk in the countryside while you can. Look at the variety that you see everywhere around you. The animals, the birds, the colours, even the weeds. are also different. Get a drop of pond water and put it on a microscope slide. A whole mini world opens up before your eyes. All this life proclaims how great God is. He has made all things well. When we have bright, sunny days, We often have lovely sunsets in the evening. God doesn't need to put the sun to bed like that, but it pleases him to do that. It pleases him to please us. Or take the snowflakes. Maybe you don't want to think about snowflakes yet for a while, but each snowflake is so small, so short-lived, yet each individually different, uniquely beautiful. There are lines from a poem that get it just right. Something lives in every hue Christless eyes have never seen. Does this world open up to you the beauty and the brilliance of your God? So Genesis 1 shows the great person who is here. Genesis 1 helps us to see the pattern that God has put into everything. Genesis 1 shows us the purposes, why he has made the world, because it's rich, because it's made for us, because he is so great and so loving. Let me just finish with one thing. Look again at verse 31, how Moses sums up the whole chapter. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning the sixth day. I think if we're honest, the state of the world today brings an ache of sadness to our hearts. It's no longer perfect, it's far from perfect. The news headlines any day will tell us that. We wish it could go back to the way it was, when pollution, decay, sin, illness and death are wiped out. And those problems aren't just outside us, they're inside us too. At the end of Genesis 1, God stands back and pronounces his verdict on the world. And in that way, Genesis 1 looks forward to the coming of one over whom God will say, this is my son whom I love. With him, I'm well pleased. He is very good. He is absolutely perfect. In this way, Genesis one shows us our need of a saviour. Your only hope in a dying world. Your only hope with a heart sick with sin is to have the life of this perfect man flowing through your veins. Do you? Do you have the son as your saviour? Has your sin been covered over, been carried off by him? Is your purpose in life to tell other people, to show other people how great and how gracious God is? Is your life patterned on his word? Are you determined that the God of Genesis 1, Father, Son, and Spirit will be the great person in your every relationship, in your every plan, in your every day? Will you say of everything in the beginning, in the middle, and at the end, God, Jesus? Your only alternative is to say, in the final reckoning, without God, forever. Let's stand as we talk to God together. Father, we do thank you for this magnificent opening to your word. It is so marvellous, but yet so simple. that children can grasp it. It's not written by a scientist. It's written by you, the God of all scientists, the God who wants to communicate with us. Father, help us as we would continue to think about these things, to see how great you are, to see how you have made all things well, to see that, yes, things have gone astray, but that this is our fault. and that it can't be put right if we seek to live on our own, if we seek to defy you. Help us to see that we need to welcome you into our lives and all of our lives so that we might have the purpose that you have designed us to have, that the pattern that you have put into this world may even be seen in our lives and that you might even be able to speak those words over us. This person who is trusting in me, this person who is my child, is very good and is welcome in my kingdom forever. Father, for any here who are not yet trusting in Jesus, help them to see the seriousness of sin and to see that only Jesus can remove it. Help them to turn from sin, and to trust in him, for we pray in Jesus' name, amen.