Sermon
June 11, 2017: Rev. Dr. Buz Wilcoxon
Introduction
Where did we come from? Why are we hear? What’s the meaning and purpose of life? These are the questions that humans have asked for as long as they have had words to ask them. Answers to those questions have taken many forms over time. Through the lenses of philosophy, mythology, and science deep thinkers have explored theories of our origins. Through the gifts of art, literature, and music artists have sought to probe the deep meaning of reality. Though the skills of engineering and craftsmanship, builders have attempted to design and create with their own hands in ways that model the patterns and truths of creation around us.
These deep questions of origin, meaning, and purpose are the questions that book of Genesis asks, and at times seeks to answer. And so, it is quite appropriate that as we journey through this book over the summer we go with many guides along the way. Not just a couple of preachers, but poets, gardeners, authors and musicians. Architects, journalists, activists, and historians. The vast and broad sweep of human knowledge and creativity will together form a web of insight that will help connect these ancient stories to our modern lives.
It was a gift to begin this morning with a poet, Dr. Sue Walker, as we consider the first chapter of the book of Genesis. It’s fitting on many levels. Poetry, that is the art of words, is perhaps the most basic and original form of art for humanity. It has been with us since, well, since “in the beginning.” It is especially important today, for unlike the rest of the book of Genesis that will follow, today’s scripture passage is at its core a poem, a liturgy, a hymn that was intended to be said or sung in the midst of worship for the Jewish people. So, with this setting of worshipful music in mind, let us turn to our passage from the very beginning of the entire biblical witness:
Genesis 1 & 2 (selected verses)
In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then 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 a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.’ And it was so. God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
And God said, ‘Let the waters under the sky 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. Then God said, ‘Let the earth put forth vegetation.’ And it was so. 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 dome of the sky to separate the day from the night.” And it was so. 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 saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
And God said, ‘Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.’ So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
And God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.’ And it was so. And God saw that it was good.
Then God said, ‘Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.’ So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it.’ And it was so. God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And God rested on the seventh day. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
Sermon
Let me tell you a story. Do you know where the world came from?
Well some very smart people knew the answer to this of course. You see, in the beginning there was a god of watery chaos named Tiamat who gave birth to all the other gods. An argument arose between the gods and a war broke out. The fiercest warrior was the god, Marduk. He defeated Tiamat and her army, and after his victory he chopped her body up into pieces. Part of it he used to make the sky. The other part of it he used to make the land. Her tail became the Milky Way. Her blood became the waters of the rivers and the sea. From the blood of her slain army Marduk made humans to serve as his slaves. Where do we all come from? From war and victory? From violence of course. Well that’s what the scholars and poets and scribes in Babylon said. The mighty empire of Babylon knew all about war and violence, and their creation story reflected it.[i]
No, that can’t be right.
There is another theory of creation. The water god named Yamm ruled over the seas and rivers, and the storm god, Ba’al served as his slave. Ba’al revolted and killed Yamm as well as several other sea monsters. He dismembered their bodies to create his new royal palace, and through his victory, the seasons are formed. That’s what the ancient Canaanites said.
No, no, that can’t be right either.
There’s another theory, that Earth god and the sky god mated with each other to produce much of the world including children (gods) who for generations would seek to kill their fathers. That’s what the Greeks taught in their mythologies.
All throughout the ancient world there were stories about how the world came into being. And the theme of violence and warfare was pervasive in these tales of creation. Instead, the biblical poem of creation begins not with multiple, jealous waring gods, but with one God, alone, who was already in existence before creation. And this one God does not battle or kill. No, in a very counter-cultural way for its original audience, Genesis tells of a God who uses the power of speech to create. It is through word not war that the cosmos are formed.
And notice as the poem goes along and it is time for life to appear the words of God begin to be addressed to other parts of creation inviting them to participate in what God is doing. “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures…Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind.” The land, sea, and sky become assistants, participants in God’s liturgy of creation. Through the power of the word God calls and creation responds with life.
Those other stories of war and violence are full of fear and death in order for the world to be created. It’s quite a pessimistic view of reality. But again, in a counter-cultural way, the Genesis poem is a story that proclaims good news. Each time that God creates, God sees that the world is good. And in the very end, once all of life (including human life) has been formed God sees that “indeed it was very good.” Humankind is not created to be slaves of a conquering warrior but to be the very image of their Creator and to be blessed with fruitful life.
Those other violent stories of creation from Babylon, and Canaan, and Greece–what conception of the world and the universe do they inspire? They see all matter, all life forms, all creation as ultimately part of a story of war and death. That’s the story of an empire. Empires are built upon the assumption that the world is a violent place and the only way to rule is at the point of a sword. Armies, battles, enemies slain in defeat, conquering more and more territory that is the cycle of life for an empire. And so it is only fitting that how they view themselves and how they tell the story of creation are one and the same.
In stark contrast to the stories of the empires, the themes of the biblical poem of creation are quite different. It is filled with much more peace and harmony. It views God not as fierce and destructive, but as imaginative and loving. The physical universe, with all its matter and energy and life, all time and space is not part of God—one the body of a defeated deity. No, the Creator is distinctly different from the creation. However, the relationship between the two is one of loving covenant. God wills for there to be a creation. God wants, desires, loves, and allows something other than God to exist. As the great poet, James Weldon Johnson imagines in his creation poem, God says, “I’ll make me a world.”[ii] I’ll make me a world! Not as a threat, but as a gift to God’s own self. God creates and God sees that his creation is very good. It is very good to God in the first place.
As I mentioned this poem of creation was written to be used in the context of worship. It’s pattern, form, repetition, and language is that of a hymn or a liturgy. It wasn’t ever intended as a scientific text book to explain in minute sub-atomic detail how or when the universe began. No, those are different questions that require different tools to answer. It was intended for folks like us—for a worshipping community of believers in ancient Israel to celebrate the truth of who created the world and why humans beings along with all the other animals exist within it. It was meant for joyful, truthful, wonder-filled worship of the living God from whom all life receives its breath and its purpose.
But there’s something more to this poem that we as modern people may miss but that was obvious to the original audience of ancient Jews worshiping in the Temple in Jerusalem. The structure of this poem is more than meets the eye. There is a pattern in the days that can be seen. In days 1 through 3 God creates realms of 1) light and darkness, 2) sky and water, and 3) dry land. Then in days 4 through 6 following the same exact order, but this time God populates those realms with the beings or creatures that inhabit them. Who lives in light and darkness? 4) the Sun, Moon, and stars. Who lives in the sky and sea? 5) birds and fish. Who lives on dry land? 6) cattle, creeping things, wild animals and humankind. One by one, in a purposeful and distinct order the three-fold pattern of creation plays out in the hymn. First three days of creating realms, then three days of populating those realms. And that pattern was immediately obvious to the worshiping Hebrews because that was the very pattern by which the Temple in Jerusalem was designed. It was built in three distinction parts 1) the Portico, 2) the Nave, and 3) the Holy of Holies. Each part of the temple had distinct groups of worshippers who were allowed to be present. Place, population, and position were important parts of how the whole community gathered in worship. [iii]
In most ancient temples of other religions is was the third chamber, the innermost holy space that a statue of the god being worshiped was found. Where do we find the image of the God of creation? “So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” For the ancient Hebrews there was no statue of God, not graven image. There was the living breathing image of humanity.
Now that three-fold pattern of the Temple works for the first 6 days, but what about the 7th day? Does it break the pattern? No, in fact it perfects it. For in the Jerusalem temple, within the Holy of Holies was the most sacred object of their faith: the Ark of the Covenant—the reminder of God’s very presence. And where is the most holy part of the creation story? Amidst all the things that God makes good and very good, what is the one thing that God “hallows”—makes holy? The 7th day. The day of rest for all creation. The day of worship, which, like the Ark in the Temple, is a reminder of God’s very presence in the pattern of creation itself.
Ok, so that might all sound a bit confusing and overly detailed, but here’s the point: The way that this creation poem is told is intentionally structured so that all of creation is described in ways that sound like the temple. The place of worship. It took Solomon 7 years to build the temple in Jerusalem, and in this poem, it takes God 7 days to build the temple of cosmos. The temple of creation. This story makes loud and clear the truth that all of creation, all of life, all matter and space and time, all of the universe is created to worship and glorify God. As our Presbyterian ancestor, John Calvin described it, all of creation is the “theatre” of God’s glory.
And at the most holy space in this temple or theatre of creation, is the 7th day, the pinnacle, the day of Sabbath rest. The day when we as humans are called to stop our own efforts and own energy and to trust in the work and care of our loving Creator. It is a break from our work of seeking to make creation in our image, to instead rest and remember the one in whose image we are all made.[iv]
So, where did we come from? Why are we here? What’s the purpose of life? The hymn of creation from the beginning of Genesis proclaims the good news that we are here (along with all the rest of creation) to worship. And as we read this hymn together we join in the powerful story that it tells.[v] We join in that very worship where “All creatures of our God and king, lift up [their] voice and with us sing.” Fulfilling our purpose in the temple of creation, when we glorify together God, we are united with “all things now living,” who “a song of thanksgiving to God our creator triumphantly raise.”
To God alone be the glory.
[i] William P. Brown, The Seven Pillars of Creation, 22-32.
[ii] James Weldon Johnson, “The Creation,” in God’s Trombones, 15.
[iii] Brown, 31-48.
[iv] Walter Brueggemann, Genesis, Interpretation Biblical Commentary, 35.
[v] Ibid, 39
Scripture
Genesis 1 & 2 (selected verses)
In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then 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 a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.’ And it was so. God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
And God said, ‘Let the waters under the sky 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. Then God said, ‘Let the earth put forth vegetation.’ And it was so. 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 dome of the sky to separate the day from the night.” And it was so. 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 saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
And God said, ‘Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.’ So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
And God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.’ And it was so. And God saw that it was good.
Then God said, ‘Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.’ So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it.’ And it was so. God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And God rested on the seventh day. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
