When the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither at once?” Matthew (21:18-19)
We began previous chapters by quoting how Jesus calmed the storm while crossing the Sea of Galilee with terrified disciples and how Jesus fed the 5,000 men plus women and children at the end of a day of preaching. The fig tree withered immediately.
When did the storm calm? Immediately.
How was the food provided to feed the multitude? Immediately.
Why do some, then, insist that it took thousands or millions of year for God to create the heavens and the Earth?
God creates immediately!
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. (Genesis 2:1)
I didn’t always, but now I accept that heavens and earth were created in six 24-hour days [I’ll explain how I came to this conclusion in a future chapter.] They weren’t one thousand years each either, as some like to claim this length of time by quoting 2 Peter 8: “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.”
Peter was not addressing Creation. He was answering the scoffers making mock of Jesus’ Second Coming. He is showing how patient and merciful God is.
The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. (2 Peter 9-10)
Now Jesus warns us about how rapidly the Lord will return and destroy the old Heavens and Earth. Instantly, like a thief in the night. This sudden coming of the Day of Lord and the end of the old creation was spoken of as he and His disciples pondered the withering of the fig tree.
“From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (Matthew 24:29-35)
Notice when the sun and moon no longer give light; and when the stars fall that all this happens right after the Great Tribulation — Immediately! The end will come as swiftly as the beginning. It will not take millions of years.
And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation. (Genesis 2:1-3)
At that time Jesus went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. But when the Pharisees saw it, they said to him, “Look, your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath.”
He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and ate the bread of the Presence, which it was not lawful for him to eat nor for those who were with him, but only for the priests? Or have you not read in the Law how on the Sabbath the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath and are guiltless? I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.” Matthew 12:1-8) Also in Luke 6:1-5)
On a Sabbath, while he was going through the grain fields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?” And Jesus answered them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?”
And he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.” (Luke 6:1-5)
And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath. (Mark 2:27-28)
God rested on the seventh day and commanded his people to do likewise.
But what day of the week was that?
God did not name the days; He didn’t say, “Oh, the weekend is here, it is Saturday time to rest.” In the Bible they spoke of the first day, the second day and so on.
Where did our names for the days of the week come from?
We have a calendar and we start the first day of each week on what we call Sunday, then Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, so Saturday is considered the last day of the week, the seventh day. So Sunday begins the week and Saturday ends it. But this is not the case according to the ISO (International Organization for Standardization), an organization backed by 163 countries to establish standards for everything. The ISO says Monday is the official first day of the week; however, the United States, Canada and Australia and a few others disagree and stick with Sunday as the first day of the week. I’m sure Israel is one that disagree as well. The Muslim countries disagree, too, but they have Saturday as the first day of the week and Friday as the seventh.
The names weren’t always the same either. On the Roman Calendar the days were named for celestial bodies, whom the Romans considered gods: Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Our English calendar retained three of these named for Roman Gods: Saturday (Saturn), Sunday (obvious) and Monday (the Moon). The other days were renamed for Norse and Germanic gods.
We Christians then, still follow the lead of the Jews, and have come to consider Saturday as the seventh day of the week and the Sabbath, because we count from Sunday.
If this is the case, why do Christians worship on Sunday and not Saturday?
Is it really because the early church fathers decided since Christ rose on Sunday that should be “The Lord’s Day” and this basically replaced the Jewish Sabbath on Saturday? But this was not the full story.
The first Christians continued worshipping on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, trying to look like they were part of the Jewish faith because Rome allowed the Jews to worship as they always had. The Way (Christians) did this until Christianity became an illegal religion as did Judaism under Roman emperors after the sacking of Jerusalem. Now it became risky to be Christian or Jew, but Christians still tried to blend in by looking like Romans. They began observing a different day for the Sabbath, and since Sunday was a day of rest for the Romans, many Christians began using it as their day of worship hoping to pass.
This was the case until Emperor Constantine came to power in 313 A.D. He legalized Christianity again and on March 7, 321 issued the Sunday Enforcement Law.
“On the venerable Day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed.”
This law was officially confirmed and adopted by the Pope at the Council of Laodicea in 364 A.D. and Christians have recognized Sunday as their day of worship ever since. Most Christian Churches thus celebrate Sunday as the day of worship because of a Pagan sun-worshipper and the Catholic Popes of Ancient Rome.
We now resume our Creation story and discover many critics claim we have two different accounts of Creation; the first being described in Genesis 1 and a different version in Chapter 2.
Balderdash!
Chapter 1 of Genesis is the overall view, while Chapter 2 gets more detailed as to what happened. One is the macro view and the other is the micro view, but they are the same story.
The opening verse of Genesis 2 makes an interesting statement.
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. (Genesis 2:1)
This, of course, leads to the question, “When did God create the angels?”
Why? Because of the term, “all the host of them”. Who is them? The word host in scripture usually refers to the Heavenly Creatures, especially Angels, so when God created the heavens and the earth he apparently created the Angels, which at the time included one named Lucifer.
It says when “the heavens and earth were finished, and all the host of them”. Does that imply God created the Heavenly Host last?
Not really.
In Exodus 20:11 it says this: “For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.”
It certainly sounds as if God did create all and everything during those six days, which included the Angels and any other Celestial beings. Look at what Paul said in Colossians 1:16:
For by him [Meaning Christ] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.
So it would be just that, all things created in those six days. We know Angels and such were there very early on because Satan was there to temp Eve and the cherubim were there to guard the Garden of Eden and the Tree of Life after the fall (Genesis 3:24).
We also know that God had meetings with his Angels and that Satan sometimes came to those gatherings from Job 1:6: “Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them.”
But just when during the six days did he create them? We may have a clue in Job that tells us they were created on the first day just before he formed the Earth. In Job 38: 4-7 God is speaking to Job:
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements—surely you know!
Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
Certainly sounds like God created the Angels first.
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.
When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground, and a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground, then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.
Some critics claim because here God created man and then God planted the Garden that he did this before the other parts of Creation spoke of in Genesis 1. It doesn’t say that at all. God planted the garden on the already existing land and man as well. Plants as food already existed in the world, but now God made special food for Man, the fruit trees and the Tree of Life.
And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.( Genesis 2:4-9)
Let’s consider the location of the Garden of Eden. Genesis 2:10-14 talks plainly about where it is located and people have arguing where this was ever since.
A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is the Pishon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is the Gihon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Cush. And the name of the third river is the Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates. (Genesis 2:10-14)
There have been three popular spots speculated for the Garden. One is in upper Saudi Arabia along the Red Sea. I think that is
unlikely. The next most popular site is at the upper end of the Persian Gulf, mainly because the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers empty into the gulf. But I go along with what is generally the popular choice of many and that is to the Eastern side of Turkey along the Armenia border. If you look at the map to the right, you will see an area between Hurrian and Assyria that might be the likely area. Mt. Ararat is near here and that is where Noah landed, and why wouldn’t the Ark have been directed back near the original place of mankind. Nimrod was a grand son of Noah. His father was Cush. Nimrod was considered a mighty warrior and a city builder. He built the city of Nimrod along the Tigris. This was in Assyria. (Genesis 10:8-10)
Nimrod continued south along the Tigris building cities where he entered what is modern day Iraq. There he stopped at what would become Babylon. Here he oversaw the building of the Tower of Babel. Archeologists have uncovered an ancient site full of ziggurats. (Ziggurats were pyramid-shaped towers, usually a type of temple, with a flat top.) It the midst of several small towers was the base and lower half of a large one known as the Great Ziggurat of Babylon (right). It
was never finished. This city sat on the Euprates and if we follow this river further south we will come to Ur. (Genesis 11:1-9)
Now Ur was a city of the Chaldees, a nation in lower Iraq which had been unable to conquer Babylon and was eventually assimilated into Babylonia.
A man named Terah, son of Nahor, lived in Ur. They were descendants of Noah’s son Shem. They began a journey toward the land of Canaan, led by Terah, which included his grandson Lot, his own son Abram and Abram’s wife Sarai. For some reason they traveled up the Euphrates going north. They got as far as Haran and settle there. (Genesis 11:28-32)
But God told Abram, whose name he would eventually change to Abraham, to get out of his father’s house with his kindred and go where God would show him (which would be Canaan).(Genesis 12:1)
See, so far for the most part every thing has flowed south with the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. But there were four rivers mentioned:
A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it
divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is the Pishon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is the Gihon.(Genesis 2:10-13)
People keep looking for one place with four rivers in it, but that is not what Scripture says. It says a river flowed from Eden and out of the Garden it divided and became four rivers. We can see on maps that a river flows from the area of Turkey where we speculate the Garden was and then it splits into the Tigris and Euphrates, but no one really knows today where the Pishon and Gihon were. I tend to agree with those who believe the Piston flowed from the top of the Persian Gulf across Arabia into the Red Sea. They also believe the Gihon began above the Red Sea, flowed south and then traveled down into Africa, maybe clear into Ethiopia.
It is likely the Garden of Eden will return when God creates the new heaven and earth and is the place described in Revelation 22:1-2. (I want to speak of those verses later.)
The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. (Genesis 2:15)
Right from the beginning man was given a job. I don’t know how hard this task was, but I am sure it was enough to keep Adam busy so he wouldn’t get bored. Work is good, although we sometimes grumble about it.
God probably wasn’t a difficult boss to please. After all, Adam had all the fruit he could eat, a great climate, friendly animals. God only demanded one rule.
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2:16-17)
Come on, how hard can that be. He was surrounded by all kinds of delicious fruit, surely he could resist that one.
Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a help meet fit for him. (Help meet also means succor, which is someone who gives assistance and support in times of hardship and distress. Well, hardship and distress hadn’t hit Adam yet, but it would.) So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said,
Famous last words:
“This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” (Genesis 2:18-23)
Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. (Genesis 2:24-25)
Now if my “Famous last words” remark wasn’t enough to get me in trouble, God made a Man and a Woman. They were supposed to become one flesh, because that is how God made them. The word translated generally as “helpmate” could have been translated “component, which is defined as a constituent that forms composes or makes up a unit or whole. We can see how that is the case. A man and a woman make up a whole, they are built to fit together.
Jesus said: But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. (Mark 10:6-9)
For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband. (Ephesians 5:33-34)
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. (Genesis 1:27-28)
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