Genesis

I just finished reading through Genesis. I had a little extra time tonight so I got a little bit ahead of schedule.

Before I note my observations, I'd like everyone who reads this to know that I am not noting my favorite parts or the coolest things. I am writing what is plain to me in the text. I am not going to tell you about how I feel like Noah right now because God is asking something of me and people are making fun of me for doing it. I won't do that because that's not what it says. It says that God told Noah to do something, not me. I am trying to read this like a five-year-old and a scholar at the same time. I'm going to read it for what it is and note my observations. Now that I've cleared that up, I'll tell you what I saw.

The first thing I noticed was God. (Surprising huh?) Not just the Father though. In verse 2 the "Spirit of God" was hovering over the waters. And in verse 26 God says, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." Since I know that in John 17:5 it says that Jesus was there before the world began, I take "us" and "our" to mean the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. All three right there in the first chapter of the Bible.

The next thing I noticed was curses. Curses all throughout chapter 3. Then immediately following the curses you see that God was not joking. In the genealogy in chapter 5 there is death, death and more death. Shortly after, God makes another declaration in chapter 6, "So the Lord said, 'I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.'" Again, I quickly noticed that God was not joking- in 7:21-23 it says, "And all flesh died that moved on the earth, birds, livestock, beasts, all swarming creatures that swarm on the earth, and all mankind. Everything on the dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life died. He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the ground, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens. They were blotted out from the earth." Wow! That's pretty self-explanatory. God said He was going to kill everything and He did.

Immediately after the curses and death and destruction, there were promises. Covenants made with Noah that said God would never destroy the earth in that way again (9:9-17). More covenants are to come. God makes covenant with Abraham and repeats His purposes many times. He will make Abraham into a great nation and give him the land of the Canaanites (12:2-3; 13:14-17; 15:4-5; 15:18-21; 16:10; 17:4-8, 15-16). Then comes the covenant of circumcision in 17:10-14. The promises start to come to fruition in the births of Isaac, then Jacob and Esau, then all of Jacob's sons. In chapter 46 it actually counts up all the people in the house of Jacob , 70 in all. So a lot of covenants, a lot of repeating of those promises, and we start to see them happening.

Then comes the story of Sodom. Very interesting. It made me look more into the cause of all these things. First the flood, then the confusion of languages at Babel, now the destruction of a city. Who carries all of these things out? God does. Genesis 7:4 "For in seven days I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and every living thing that I have made I will blot out from the face of the ground." Genesis 11:6,7 "And the Lord said, '... Come let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.'" Genesis 18:22-23 "... but Abraham still stood before the Lord. Then Abraham drew near and said, 'Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?'" Genesis 19:13 "For we are about to destroy this place, because the outcry against its people has become great before the Lord, and the Lord has sent us to destroy it." I found all of that very interesting. I remember it being a big deal in Job that God doesn't do the things to Job, He just allows Satan to. (More on that when I get to Job.) Apparently God is able to do destructive things.

Also note a couple of other places where God blatantly controls something. Genesis 2:5 "... for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land..." Genesis 8:1 "... God made a wind blow over the earth..." Genesis 20:6 "Then God said to him (Abimelech) in the dream, 'Yes, I know that you have done this in the integrity of your heart, and it was I who kept you from sinning against me. Therefore, I did not let you touch her." Genesis 20:18 "For the Lord closed all the wombs in the house of Abimelech..." Genesis 21:19 "Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water." Genesis 30:22-24 "Then God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and opened her womb. She conceived and bore a son and said, 'God has taken away my reproach.' And she called his name Joseph saying, 'May the Lord add to me another son!'" (Which seems to indicate that they knew God was in control.) I'm not going to write them all out but I will give you references to look at. Genesis 33:5,11; 39:2-5,21,23; 41:25,28,32,52; 45:5-9; 48:9,11; 49:24-25; 50:20,24. Now the most interesting one to me is Genesis 45:5-9 talking about the story of Joseph. Because in the text previous to this, it is obvious that Joseph's brothers are the ones that sold him into slavery and Pharaoh is the one who appointed him over all of Egypt. But listen to this, "'And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt. Hurry and go up to my father and say to him, 'Thus says your son Joseph, God has made me lord of Egypt.'" I just find that amazing. He explicitly says, "it was not you who sent me here, but God." I would normally think 'Oh it's just somebody giving God credit for something that happen. Instead of saying they got lucky, they say God did it for them.' But this is the Bible. Therefore the things in it are true. I just find that extremely interesting.

Another thing that I saw a lot of towards the end of the book was the fear of God. In chapter 31 (v. 42, 53) Jacob even refers to God as "the Fear of Isaac." In my class this past fall on Proverbs we talked quite a bit about the Fear of the Lord and how important it was to the Israelites, so I will keep my eye out for that.

One more thing was how many times God's chosen (18:19) people messed up and should have messed up God's promises to them. Twice Abraham tells a king that Sarah is his sister. He could have easily had her taken from him and Isaac would never have been born. Isaac did the exact same thing with Rebekah and Abimelech in chapter 26. Yet once again, none of the men take her. More interestingly to me is that when Jacob and Esau come out of the womb in 25:23, God tells Rebekah that Esau will serve Jacob. Isaac still plans to bless Esau and make Jacob his servant, but Rebekah and Jacob are deceitful and God's "prediction" comes true. In this case, His purposes were fulfilled by someone being sinful.

So those are my findings in the book of Genesis. I will continue to note the things that I observe in my readings. I'm still processing a lot of them and can't tell you the implications of all of them. Maybe in the Psalms or Prophets or the New Testament I will find something that discounts them. I don't know. So, for now they will only be notes. Also this is not the sole purpose of the blog. It is meant to encourage and challenge by finding and telling truths about God. That is why I have the videos and articles up. I believe they are things that these men have found to be true of God in scripture. If you want to discuss, we can discuss. Otherwise, let my notes be a challenge to you to read God's word and see what you find about Him.

Grace and peace,

Mitchell