Genesis: The God of Bara

So our text this morning was Genesis 2, 4 through 14.

Anytime there's difficult rivers or towns or areas, I like to make other people read it.

So thank you, Davis.

Appreciate that.

Several weeks ago, we talked about how Genesis was written to an ancient audience, to an ancient people.

So at the time there were conversations going on about how the earth got here.

How come there's some sort of order and structure in this world?

Like, how come frogs get to live in water and on land, but fish only get to live in water?

How come my arm hairs know when to stop growing, but the hairs on my head keep growing?

How come there's some sort of structure, some sort of order?

How come spring always comes?

It never just stays winter.

Spring always comes.

How come there's all this structure?

So these are these questions going on.

How come all this structure?

How come all this order?

And where did the material come for all this structure and this order to be created?

Where did I come from?

Where did you come from?

And so these people, the Egyptians, the Babylonians, and the Sumerians, they're asking these questions.

Where did all this come from?

Well, their creation myths were about fallible gods, multiple fallible gods who fought chaos monsters, nasty chaos monsters, and out of the chaos we got earth, and we got people.

We got you, and we got the frogs who were created.

This was their creation myths, their creation stories.

And so Genesis 1 through 3 is written for us, but it is written to them.

We have to understand that, right?

Like it's written for us, it's for us, but it's written to them, to an ancient audience hearing all these creation myths.

And here comes the story of the people of God from God, one God who created not out of chaos and not out of struggle, but created out of love.

So maybe you remember as we worked our way through Genesis 1, that great poetic explanation of the creation.

And the word creates keeps being used.

In the beginning, God created, God baraad, and then on day three, he created it in day one, day two, day four, day five, day six, he created, he created.

He brad, he brad, he brad.

That's the word brah, then God baraad this, and then God barah that.

And fifty times this word barah is used in the Old Testament.

That's interesting, fifty times in the Old Testament.

The more interesting thing is all 50 have to do with God barraying.

God creating.

This word is just for God.

Because nobody, nobody baras except God.

Now, people create, you create, and I create, but we don't berah.

We don't create with the ability to hold all things in order.

Have you ever said something like, I feel like things are out of control?

I feel like my life is not in control.

I feel like I can't get control.

Have you ever said something like that?

You have good reason.

And this is, you know why?

Because you are not in control.

That's why you feel that way.

You feel that way because it's true.

I feel that way because it's true.

But what we try to do is we try to barra, right?

But we don't brah.

All 50 times barra in the Old Testament's always for God.

There's a point that the writers are saying to us.

And see, we try to use our creative powers to control our world so we feel safe and we feel loved.

But in case you haven't noticed, it doesn't work.

Actually, usually when we move into the realm of bra, of trying to create to the point of holding order in our worlds, we actually make things worse.

It's kind of like uh let's say yesterday you had a planter.

You got a planter for your front porch, and it's a lovely planter, but you don't have a plant for it yet.

And so you go, I'm gonna go to Home Depot.

It's a beautiful day out, I'm gonna go to Home Depot.

You go to Home Depot and you buy a fern for your planter.

And you're so excited to be productive on a beautiful day and to be kind of earthy and to be around green stuff, and so you buy your fern and you get home, and when you get home, you realize you didn't buy any soil.

And so you have to go back to Home Depot again, separate trip, back to Home Depot to buy the soil.

You end up with the same cashier, he sort of knows it, you know it, neither of you say anything.

That's kind of weird, but you move on, you get back home, now you have your planter, you have your soil, you have your fern.

You put your soil in, you put your fern in.

At this point, you love this project, you love this fern, you are putting forth all your effort for this fern, and so you plant it and you water it every time you pull in your driveway.

This fern looks so good on your porch.

You love it.

And so you water it and you care for it, and you water it more and you water it more because you love it so much.

You want it to do so well.

And so you keep watering it, and before long, do you know what happens before long?

It starts to brown a little bit.

But you keep watering it.

You can water it out of this.

And then there's no new growth, and then the soil starts to have this greenish look on it.

And you know what happened, you overwatered it.

And all of your excitement and all of your control, you ruined it.

See, I know these types of stories because this is what this is what I do.

Like I do this very, very well.

I make things worse all the time.

Because I don't like to surrender.

I don't like to admit that I can be a part of something, but I don't have total, ultimate control or creative power.

And so I just keep going on.

Like I'm the one who barraws peace and barraws order.

And when we do that, we smother.

You've seen it, right?

Like you want your spouse to change, and so you keep giving helpful tips.

Christy's been moving the laundry in our house into the washing machine without it going to the hamper first.

I like it to go to the hamper first.

I've explained this several times.

How has my helpful tips helped?

Has it?

No.

It has not helped at all.

If anything, it's made it worse.

What she wants to do is not do anything that I ask her to do because I keep giving helpful tips.

Right?

Maybe you've done it with children.

Maybe you're you're older, your children are grown, and you look back and you go, man, I over-controlled.

I smothered.

Or maybe you're seeing it play it out right now.

Or maybe you're the kid and your parents are over-controlling you, and you know what happens every time when you get over-controlled?

The kid feels suffocated.

What do they do?

They run.

They run.

This is all because you're trying to be the ultimate creator of peace and order by exerting more and more control.

And so at some point we have to face the really good question.

If you want to have everything under control, under your ability to barraw, which is an illusion, under your ability to barraw, if you have under control everything before you have peace, how long will you have to work?

So, point number one is this.

A few points.

I have four points this morning.

Point number one, peace begins with surrender to the God who barws, not you.

I love where this word appears, barod appears in Genesis 1.21.

So God created, he baroded, the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves.

Now we read over that, right?

Just read over it and go, oh, he created, oh, he created lots of stuff, and here he created sea creatures.

But the people reading this at the time, these ancient people, would have immediately thought of like ancient creation myths that are all floating around about the gods, multiple fallible gods, who are fighting chaos monsters.

Sea creatures.

And so this is the writer's way of sort of putting a finger on an ancient story that's going around and going, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

The one God he created.

He created the chaos monsters.

The greatest things you don't understand and cannot control, he is greater than those.

I was talking to my uncle this week about some sad things that have occurred in our family.

And a family member has lost their son to suicide.

And my uncle was saying, I just don't know how people, how they make it through if they don't have an outside source, outside of time and circumstance, who can be with them in it.

He's like, I don't know how they make it through.

Now what was he saying?

What was he saying when he said this?

Well, he was saying there's a lot of chaos monsters in the world.

I need an outside source.

Right?

When my parents divorced, when I couldn't find a job, when I watched my grandfather get eaten up by cancer, when my wife miscarried, when I had two friends commit suicide, when I'm so anxious, I just want to run away.

When everything is good and I'm afraid everything's gonna become bad.

When I feel lonely, when I feel pointless, all these chaos monsters that I don't understand.

And Genesis says to the chaos monsters, that seems so powerful to us, and they they feel that way, they legitimately feel that way.

Says those chaos monsters don't have to rule your life.

You don't have to be afraid.

You were never created out of struggle or for chaos.

You were created out of and for love.

Now we get to Genesis 2.4, and this phrase, Lord God, shows up.

First time in the Bible this shows up.

Lord God.

So not Elohim, the word God throughout Genesis 1, which is a much more kind of general term for God.

It's like creator.

One personal, just a term for God.

But Lord God's different.

It's very personal.

This is about God's positioning and posturing to the world.

It's the word Yahweh.

It's as close of a word could get to breath as possible.

And that's just that's the point.

He's as near to you as your breath.

Yahweh.

So that's point number two.

God, from the very beginning, was personal.

And you go, oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

I've read the Old Testament.

It's not personal.

It's crazy.

Like there's some crazy stuff going on in the Old Testament.

I understand.

I've read the Old Testament too.

There is crazy stuff going on in the Old Testament.

But you have to understand, God is progressively revealing Himself to humanity.

A humanity.

A humanity that's heard a whole bunch of creation chaos myths.

A humanity that believes every battle should be given back to the God.

To these people, God is progressively revealing himself.

He is saying, before this progressive revelation plays out through the Old Testament and comes to its climax in Jesus, he's saying in Genesis from the very, very beginning, I'm personal.

Now some details come out in Genesis 2 about Eden, this garden that God creates for the people.

There's a garden, it's beautiful, it's organized, there's a river, it splits into four rivers.

There's gold, there's bedelium, there's onig stone.

And I've just always sort of read all of this and thought to myself, wow, it was beautiful.

And just moved on.

That's kind of what's the extent of it.

But some people believe that this is alluding to the fact, these materials, very distinct materials, why would you choose these materials?

Why would the writer choose these materials?

These are the same materials, some of the same materials found in the temple in the Old Testament.

And temples are places that these people believed gods reside.

So why would the writer be doing this?

Why would Eden look like this when also the temple looked like this?

So hang on to that.

Last week I was lying in bed with my four-year-old, I was tucking her in, and she, like a wise sage, looks at me like she's been preparing this statement all day, and she says, Daddy, we live in God's heart, and God lives in our heart.

And I go, Well, my parenting is done.

I can quit.

I've accomplished all of my goals.

And then she asks, Where is God?

Which I thought to myself, well, you already answered it when you told me that sentence.

That sentence was really profound.

You covered it already, but I said, Well, God's here.

God's everywhere.

And she just thought that was hilarious.

She started laughing.

She said, Daddy, that doesn't make any sense.

That makes no sense.

And of course it didn't make any sense.

We've been reading this Jesus storybook Bible, me and her at night.

And the stories we've been reading about Jesus, a man.

He's in one place at one time.

And this is God to her.

And it is God, but it's one form of God for us to know, in the three forms of God, right?

From the very beginning, there's Elohim, there was the Christ, which we know in Jesus, and there was the Spirit.

And so she goes, Oh, no, no, no.

Jesus?

Everywhere?

No, no, no.

I know the stories, he's just in one place at one time.

But see, I've worked it out a little bit more than her.

I've had a few years.

And so I said to her, Well, hey, a bicycle can only be in one place at one time, but air can be everywhere.

And I thought that was fantastic.

It didn't seem to do anything.

I thought it settled it, that you would never again question the omnipresence of God, like all of us have all that figured out.

The bicycle statement would do it.

Okay, so what was my point with that story?

Because Genesis is saying something to us about that, about that question that even as a four-year-old you're starting to ask.

And as a 40-year-old and an 80-year-old, you're still asking it.

And in Genesis, the writer is talking to a people who believed gods, or for these people, one God lived in the temple.

And the writer is saying, no, from the very beginning, this God is with you.

This God is with you.

When you're working the fields or loading the dishes, or you're walking in the halls, or you're studying, you're working on a spreadsheet, or when you're having sex, when you're exercising, when you're running your finances.

God's with you in that.

When you're filled with joy, but also when you're filled with anxiety.

When the chaos monsters inside of you just feel like they're overwhelming you, or chaos monsters out in the world feel like they're overwhelming you.

And all of that, He is with you.

He's not just in the temple.

And what we get throughout the Old Testament is this progressive revelation for us to understand who God is, that He's not just in the temple, but that He is everywhere.

And He can reside in us.

So He is with you and He creates the inside of the core of who you are.

2 Corinthians 5.17, one of my favorite verses.

If anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation.

So point number three is this kind of a summary point of a whole bunch of that.

That was maybe a little convoluted.

Summary point.

Chaos monsters can never truly crush you.

And separation from God is never a real threat.

Chaos monsters can never truly crush you, and separation from God is never a real threat.

Point number four, last point.

The God who barod.

The God who barod at the very beginning still baraz.

There's once a king, the Hebrew people, you probably know this story.

It's battle time, it's war time.

This king's at home.

Probably shouldn't have been at home.

He probably should have been off at war, but he's at home and he sees this pretty lady on a rooftop.

And she is good looking.

And so he sins for her.

Shouldn't have done that.

Sins for her.

Sleeps with her.

Word comes back she's pregnant.

This isn't good.

Her husband's away at war.

It's gonna be real clear that the baby's his, not good.

And so this maybe should be the moment he comes clean.

But he digs the hole a little bit further.

Sends for the husband, he gets his plan.

He says, I know how I'll cover this up.

I'll send for the husband, I'll get the husband to come back because when he comes back, he's been away at war.

Surely he's gonna sleep with his wife.

He's been away at war.

But the husband's this upright good guy, he gets back.

He won't sleep with his wife while his men are off fighting war, and so he doesn't sleep with her.

And so now, King David, that's the guy's name, this king, he has a whole nother problem.

Now what do I do?

Well, maybe he should come clean.

But he doesn't.

He digs the hole even further, and so he sends the guy, the husband, back to war with a note saying, put him on the front line so he'll be killed.

That'll settle it.

And then what the king does is then the king marries the lady.

So this king carries with him at this point all of this: this shame, the lust, the adultery, perhaps rape.

We're not sure.

We're not sure if she willingly slept with him or felt forced or was forced to sleep with him.

We don't know.

But all of that, the lying, the cover-up, the murder, the forced marriage, this is the chaos he carries.

Not to mention what she might carry.

We just get the story of him, but this is the chaos he carries.

And what do you do with the chaos you carry?

When you wonder if you're loved and all of this loss.

The loss we'll learn about come Genesis 3.

Right now, Genesis 1 and Genesis 2, it's all love.

It's love.

First part of the story, love.

Second part, loss.

Third part, love.

And David is in loss.

And then in Psalm 51, 10, we get this great verse where he's just at the end of himself.

He is done.

He has nowhere to go.

He can't earn his way out of this, merit his way out of this.

And he says, create.

He says, berrah.

The same word.

Berra in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit with me.

He's saying, God, you're the only one who can bra.

Fifty times in the Old Testament, every time it's for God.

See, all of our self-salvation efforts and religion and moralism and achievement, all of it, the comparison games we play to build ourselves up, they have no power to create peace and order in our lives.

Absolution from our sins, from our shame, rest before the chaos monsters of anxiety and achievement and all of this.

We can't barra ourselves out of this.

We never had the power to do that.

But God is spirit, and God is everywhere, and God creates new life in us.

And it's not by our work, but it's by the grace which was there from the very beginning and known concretely for us in the work of Jesus, in his death, and his resurrection.

So, my brothers and sisters, the one who brouded the stars and the sky, the one who berod all of that, he is personal, and he is with you, and he will never leave you.

This is your God and Savior, Jesus the Christ.

Let's pray together.

God, thank you for the great promises from the very beginning that they were there.

That you are gracious, you are good.

Forgive us for trying to exert ourselves to be gods in our own worlds.

There's only one God, and it's you.

Forgive us for trying to be saviors of our own world.

To try to use our righteousness to be pleasing to you when it's only your righteousness that we receive in Jesus that makes us pleasing to you.

Forgive us for trying to bolster our value by what we produce in this world when it's only living as your beloved children will we ever have peace.

God, we thank you that you have created us and that you create life in us by the power of the death and the resurrection of Jesus.

May we find our life not in our abilities to produce more and more life, but in our humbling of our death in Jesus, that we might have life in you.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.