Image via WikipediaGENESIS CHAPTERS 1 and 2
Genesis being the book of the beginnings tells something about two things:
1. The beginning of the world (Genesis 1:1-25)
The beginning consists of the origin of the universe, where it explains the beginning of many important realities: the universe, the earth, people, sin and God’s plan of salvation. It unfolds the beginning of the World, human beings, family, civilization and salvation. God reveals his personality and nature as a creator, sustainer, judge, and redeemer. It also teaches us that the earth is well made and good.
2. The beginning of the human being (Genesis 1:26; Genesis 2:25)
The value and dignity of human beings made in His own image; culminating with a man and woman made like him is God’s deepest desire to relate and fellowship with the people he created.
PERSONAL: BEING A MODERN DAY CHRISTIAN
This story of creation is a personal reminder for me as a modern day Christian to firmly hold on my faith that God indeed created us and that no other modern belief or theory can ever disprove or destroy such truth. It teaches me more about God and my identity with God being part of His great creation.
I gained depth in my faith as I see God’s creative power and his eternal nature. I also see how he valued us more than the animals. (Genesis 1:26 - 28). It’s giving me high self-esteem as a human being and giving me as well a sense of responsibility to take care of what I am in charge of, the animals, plants, and the rest of His creation. It teaches me to respect everything and everyone as I respect myself being His wonderful creation very well loved and valued.
God rested on the seventh day, which means that I have to take time out of my busy schedule to rest in order to refresh myself. (Genesis 2:2-3)The seventh day was blessed by God as He set it aside to be holy, where the Ten Commandments in the book of Exodus 20:1-17 emphasized the observance of the Sabbath day. A day of worship or thanksgiving moment with Him therefore is personally important.
As a modern day Christian, these two chapters have outlined the origins of how God created this universe and His purpose to have people set apart to worship him. He did this by creating man in His own image and from man he created a woman to give him company. (Genesis 1:26) God forms and equips both man and woman for various tasks where it leads to the same goal - to honor God. Man gives life to woman; woman gives life to the world. (Genesis 2:21 – 23)
SPIRITUAL: MODERN DAY CHURCH
This chapter is a valuable reference of the modern day church to defend and deepen the theology of creation. It is also a great challenge for the church to promote the value of marriage, family, children, the natural environment, and procreation.
God’s work was not complete until he made woman, where he made her from the man’s flesh and bone. (Genesis 2:18-24). This is a reference of the church’s teaching on marriage and at the same time a reference that shows the significance of opposite sex marriage and respect for women and the interdependence of man and women. that man and woman symbolically become one flesh. The goal of marriage should be based on oneness instead of friendship, as God gave marriage as a gift to Adam and Eve. Marriage being God’s idea and gift to us should therefore be respected.
SOCIAL: SOCIETY IN 2011
Our modern day society is confronted with many issues relevant to the values already presented in the book of Genesis. The primary issue is genetic engineering, which alters the natural genes of God’s original creation. This issue is linked to many other bio-ethical issues related to God’s natural creation such as cloning, test tube babies, sex change and a lot more. All these are coming out because conservative and moral people cannot accept the fact that most of these if not all are affecting us morally, socially, and environmentally. All these concerns simply affirms the existence of people who still value God’s creation, and people who glorifies and appreciates God gift of nature. Another undeniably hot issue is on marriage. Marriage being a commitment that perpetuates and cares God creation is threatened by certain problems of the modern day society such as divorce, legalized abortion, same sex marriage, etc. These are considered issues because there are still many human beings who still value life, family, and pro-creation. Although marriage is respected in almost all cultures, still we cannot deny the increasing number of dysfunctional families, divorce, abortion, unwanted pregnancies and same sex marriages.
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