Maker of Heaven and Earth

Mike Johnson is the Speaker of the U. S. House of Representatives. He is a lawyer, and he is a Baptist, from Louisiana. Shortly after his election to the top spot in the House, he spoke publicly about his faith. “I am a Bible-believing Christian…. Pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it. That’s my worldview.” I want to speak today about this biblical world view.  This is a phrase used frequently by some Christians in an effort to ground their ideas and their behaviors in the Bible. The phrase “biblical worldview” is used more often than “Christian worldview.” I prefer to speak of a Christian worldview, but today I want to talk about this idea of a Biblical Worldview. Most people who use it are on the conservative side of things, including theology, politics, and ethics. To call something “biblical” caries great weight in their circles. But we also take the Bible seriously; we also considered the Bible the inspired Word of God; we also want to ground our faith and practice in a solid and serious reading of the Bible. Stay with me today while I speak to you about a Bible Worldview. There are five pieces to this religious puzzle. There are five components to this Worldview. There are five stages of history understood through the providence of God. As religious people who have gathered today to worship God, read God’s Word, and order our lives according to the will of God, we need to know the five components of the Biblical Worldview. Write these down, for there will be a quiz, and these five things will be on the final exam. One, Creation. Two, Contamination or sin. Three, Election.  Four, Redemption or Salvation. And five, the Consummation of all Things. Every thoughtful and practicing Christians needs to understand that these are the five stages of what scholars call “salvation history.” These are the five ideas of the Biblical Worldview. And today, I want to talk about Creation. I. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” This is the opening statement of the Bible. It is fundamental. It is important. It is where we start. The Apostles Creed has a similar beginning. “I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.” That phrase—maker of heaven and earth—comes from the Bible itself. There is a story in the book of Genesis about Abraham. It is told in the 14th chapter. Abram goes to battle to defend one of his neighbors. After the battle, the priest of El Elyon, God most high, greets Abram, and blesses him with this blessing, “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, creator of heaven and earth.” This understanding of God as creator of heaven and earth was not unique to the Hebrew people and it is not unique to Christians today. The majority of religious people in the world today—Jews, Christians, Muslims, and many others—believe that God created the universe. This is the theme of the Hebrew poem we know as Psalm 104. Let us read this psalm and note the way it oscillates between the God who created and the God who is creating. In verse 5, it reads, “You placed the world on its foundation so it would never be moved.” Then in verse 10, the verb tense changes to read, “You make springs pour water into ravines so streams gush down from the mountains.” In verse 19, it describes God this way, “You made the moon to mark the seasons and you send the darkness and it becomes night.” Here the action of God long ago is asserted right along the action of God yesterday. God made things happen in the beginning, and God is making things happen today. God the maker of heaven and earth was at it at the beginning and is still at it today. Astronomers are at the cutting edge of discovery today. They use the two big telescopes that were sent into space, the Hubble and the Webb. Using these, they peer into deep space, into galaxy clusters that are a long way from earth, up to 10 billion light years away. With these telescopes, they can watch stars being born! Science sheds light on the creation. But science has been the chief challenge to the religious understanding of things. The Polish astronomer Copernicus is given credit for the first major scientific proposal in the western world. In the mid-15th century, he published a book asserting that the earth moves around the sun. The emergence of science has been a great challenge to Christianity. In the 2000-year history of Christianity, perhaps only Islam has presented an ideological challenge to Christianity that equals the strength and success of Science. Science postulates that all natural and visible things have a natural cause that can be discovered and named. Once upon a time, the universal assumption was that supernatural forces caused everything. That is the premise of the Bible. But along came Science and asserted that natural forces caused everything. The chief illustration of this has been the theory of evolution. It proposes that the universe is massive and very old, that earth is not the center of all things, not even of our solar system, and that all of this can be explained by basic laws of nature. Our faith has struggled with how to reconcile our faith in “God the Father, maker of heaven and earth,” with our delight in science and all that it has explained and made possible. Many Christians and many Christian traditions have denounced science and especially evolutionary concepts. People quoted the Bible to push back against science. They proclaimed, its either science or the bible, the scientific world view or the biblical worldview. I reject this either-or proposition. I believe in the God of the Bible, the One who created the heavens and the earth. I believe God created in the beginning and God is still creating today. Every star that is born in a galaxy far, far away is created by God, and I listen and learn from the astronomers who are measuring distance and time, who are taking pictures of all the amazing things that are happening in the stary, stary night. We don’t know how God created the heavens and the earth, and if scientists can discover how these things happen, I say, “More power to them.” Let us encourage our grandchildren to become astronomers and biologists and mathematicians. Let them learn all they can, explore all they can, and discover all they can. God is in the universe, and God is in the imagination of kids learning math in a middle school in Polk County! II. But the important thing is not what God did at the beginning of all things; it is what God is creating today. The urgent thing for us to know is not what God did in space or even in history, but what God is doing here, in this very room, and here, in your life and in your home. Is God the maker of heaven and earth creating something in you? Is God the redeemer of all the world redeeming you? Is God the One who knows all the mathematical formulas and geometric angles and biological taxonomy, or is God the One who knows you, your strengths and weaknesses, your aspirations and fears, your problems and your potential? Jeremiah the prophet announced that God was doing a new thing in his day, more than 2500 years ago? Is God doing a new thing today? Is God doing a new thing in your life? Paul wrote to the early believers in Corinth and asserted this, “Anyone who is in Christ, is a new creation!” Are you a new creation? Is God creating something in you and through you? Some of you are just beginning your adult life, and some of you are nearer the end of your adult life. But the question is the same for both: can God create in you a clean heart, a new faith, a fresh aspiration, a new way to walk? Can the creator of the ends of the earth do a new work in you? Or are you turning all your attention to finding a job and launching a career? Are you seeking, not the new creation God desires for you, but the new career you have dreamed of for years? Or are you just focused on retirement and making sure you don’t run out of money? Are you just focused on taking your medicine and staying out of the hospital? When we succumb to the pull of our own survival or the temptations of our own ambitions, we forget that the God of all the Universe, the Maker of Heaven and Earth, has plans for you and me. Is it ever too late to become the person God intends for you to be, to achieve the fundamental life goal of growing into maturity as a person, as a Christ-following person? III. The Genesis narratives tell this story, God worked for six days to create the universe, this earth, the garden, and the man and the woman; then God rested. Chapter two, verses one and two read like this: “So the creation of the heavens and the earth and everything in them was completed. On the seventh day God had finished the work of creation, so he rested from all his work.” Did God retire? Does this mean that God worked for a while, then stopped, sat in his celestial chair, and took up the task of observer? Some think so. They are called deist. God sat everything in motion, then God sat back and waited and watched. Many people think so. God is not involved in life today, they contend. God finished the work and took a long nap. It is called sabbath. Many of our nation’s Founding Fathers, such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, were this sort of Christian, Deist. On the one hand, we do not own enough this sabbath rest idea, true. Churches big and small, families religious and secular, tend to fill up the sabbath day with activity. I am troubled by all this, in my own life and in the life of this church. Think of all that is going on among our small band of believers: worship, meal, conversation, food preparation, meal, clean-up. Plus all the personal and family things that are scheduled for Sunday. In the old days, in Israel, Sabbath was serious business. I remember when we were living in Jerusalem. Some shops closed on Friday; they were the Muslims. Some stores closed on Saturday; they were the Jews. Some shops closed on Sunday; they were the Christians. You could tell a person’s faith by when they closed their shop. This Genesis narrative was written to show how their practice of sabbath was rooted in the will of God from the very beginning. The story of creation was crafted to demonstrate the sacredness of sabbath. First came the sabbath day of rest, then came the seven-day story of creation. That does not undermine our need for sabbath rest, but it must not convince us that God has quit working. Yes, God rested, and so should we, but then God went back to work, doing the eternal work of providence, of redemption, of lifting up all of us and helping us survive the financial and health and relational crises of our days. God is at work taking the corruption of the world and make it a new creation. God is at work taking the decaying elements of our lives and of this world and giving them new lift. God is at work transforming indifference into commitment, doubt into faith, depression into joy, sin into righteousness, death into life. God is at work in Ukraine, and in Gaza, and also along the Rio Grande. In those places, God is trying to save lives, bring peace, and cultivate hope. We need to join God in that work, there. But what about here? What is God the maker of heaven and earth doing in your life today, this sabbath day? What sin is God forgiving and cleansing? What habit is God overpowering and destroying? What emptiness is God filling with joyful singing and hopeful living? Two years ago, I preached through Paul’s letter to the Christians in Philippi. That wonderful letter begins this way, “I am confident of this, that the One who began a good work among you and in you will bring it to completion by the Day of Jesus Christ.” Isn’t that a terrific promise? That the maker of heaven and earth is creating in you and among us a good work, a new creation, and when Jesus Christ appears, this work will have ended, completely finished. That is the gospel of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.