Bible Study Genesis Part 6-Bohu

Welcome to the program Study in the Chapel.

God's Word is supreme at Chapel Ministries.

We consider it absolutely essential to a proper relationship with God.

We study it, we love it, we rely on it every minute of every day.

The following program is an edited recording of the regular Bible studies we hold.

And we decided to share these with you in the hope that you too will be able to find inspiration, encouragement, and ultimately salvation through discovering Christ in Scripture.

Our intention is to travel all the way through the Bible.

It will be a challenging journey, but one that will undoubtedly bring you to a decision.

Through this study, you will be faced with either believing or rejecting what God has said to us.

It is our intention to provide you with enough knowledge to make an informed decision about God and his word.

We strongly encourage you to listen intently and diligently, because though at the moment you may not realize it, these things are truly a matter of life and death.

In fact, these are matters of eternal life and eternal death.

Never treat what God has said lightly.

There's truly nothing more important to you.

Now join us as we seek God's will through his inspired word.

Wait a minute, you're going to the Old Testament.

I thought you were a Christian organization.

That's right.

The Old Testament is telling us the same story that the New Testament is telling us.

It's telling us about the salvation that Jesus Christ provides us.

Yeah, I know you didn't see the name Jesus Christ in the Old Testament, but that doesn't mean he's not there.

He's there in what they say, theologians say, type and shadow.

And as we go through this, you're going to see exactly what we're talking about.

So as I said, we're still in the book of Genesis.

We've been here now for a few weeks.

We're really stuck on these first few verses.

There's a purpose behind this.

We'll get into that a little bit more as we continue on in this teaching.

This week and next week, we're still going to be bogged down on these first few verses.

Last time we finished with a mystery.

We had a mystery last time, as everybody remembers.

We were told in the Bible that the earth went from the perfect creation born out of the perfect mind and spirit of God, something meant to be vibrant and alive, to something that was without form and void.

Tohu and bohu.

The word void is the translation of the Hebrew bohu.

You already know tohu.

It's without form.

That's the without form thing.

Tohu and bohu.

Though it sounds whimsical, it's anything but.

It may be fun to say, but its meaning is rather unsettling.

Tohu and bohu, those are the Hebrew words, without form and void.

Well, we can be certain that God didn't make the earth tohu and bohu.

God didn't create it without form and void.

We covered that last time, of course.

To say that God created the earth tohu and bohu is in direct contradiction to what God says elsewhere in Scripture.

And we specifically picked Isaiah 45, 18.

You remember that.

Let's read it real quick.

For thus saith the Lord, this is God speaking.

Isaiah is speaking with the words, but God is speaking through him.

Thus saith the Lord that created the heavens, God Himself that formed the earth and made it.

That's where the first, the second time, at least the second time, probably more.

That's where Tohu is located.

Without, when we see the words in vain, that means Tohu.

And in Genesis 1, it's without form.

Here it's in vain.

He did make it in vain.

He formed it to be inhabited.

That's the rest of Isaiah 45, 18 says.

He did not create it in vain.

He did not create it tohu.

He formed it to be inhabited.

So the only way that verse 2 makes sense and more importantly, communicates truth is to conclude that since it wasn't created that way, at some point the earth became without form and void.

And that is precisely what Genesis 1, 2 says.

The earth became, not was, the earth became without form and void.

Something happened if it went from God's creation to something dark and unspeakable.

But let me say before I go on, this is controversial.

Among the most conservative Bible scholars, they will not agree that the Bible says these things.

They say when people say that it says became without form and void, that all they're trying to do is compromise with the evolution.

It's not so.

Listen, just because science is wrong doesn't mean we have to avoid everything that they say.

Yes, they were wrong, but we cannot change the Bible just because we don't want to appear as if we're agreeing with them.

That's being a little bit conservative despite your face, to kind of change that saying around.

God created the earth to be inhabited, but it became without form and void.

Something happened to it.

But what?

What happened between verses one and verse two?

Well, I hate to let you down, but if I'm being honest, I'd have to say I don't know.

In fact, what's even more disappointing is that no one knows.

And do you know why no one knows?

Of course you do.

No one knows because we aren't told.

God simply mentions that at some point the earth became to who and bohu, and that's all we get.

No cause, no reason, just fact.

Well, why even tell us that?

Spoiler alert: God is telling us about a recreative process.

He's telling us about something that went from dark and hopeless to full of life by his actions.

God is preaching the gospel in Genesis 1, 2.

Back to our current conversation.

What happened?

We don't know.

I think we can make an educated guess, educated, because there are a few clues in the record.

I believe we can piece together from other parts of the Bible a vague idea, but I don't think that would be a good use of our time.

But I will say this there was some sort of catastrophe, maybe more than one that struck at least the earth.

I believe, listen to me, this is going to sound cuckoo to you, but I believe before there were men on the earth that there were other types of creatures here.

And somehow a sort of worldwide, again, at least worldwide calamity struck.

John, aren't you?

It sounds like you're going into the land of science fiction there.

You're saying before there was men on the earth, there were other creatures.

Yes, I believe that.

And it's biblical.

Very, very thin record, but we'll get to that when we get there.

It's possible that that calamity that hit was caused by them or because of them.

Whether it was God that brought it on or those creatures that inhabited the place, we don't know.

We have no details.

Everything we come up with will be speculation.

What we can say is that it's quite clear, if you're willing to look at it objectively, that some sort of profound change must have occurred somewhere in the time between the events of Genesis 1.1 and the report we're given in Genesis 2.

And something else we can be relatively certain of, whatever did occur happened over a very long period of time.

Listen, you don't go from a perfect straight from the mind of God, life-sustaining creation to without form and void overnight.

Those of us that have been around a while, we've heard the arrogance of mankind claiming that our nuclear weapon technology could wipe out this entire earth.

You don't hear that so much anymore, but when 70s and 80s, 60s, 70s and 80s, we heard that all the time.

The bomb is gonna blow up the earth.

Not even close.

Now, we may be able to wipe out most of the life on the surface of the earth, but that's not what's described in Genesis 1, 2.

Whatever happened way back then disrupted the natural processes of the entire world, at least.

Whatever it was, it was far more powerful than any of our puny little weapons.

Whatever the cause, it rendered the earth at least a wasteland.

It made it vacuous, it made it a place of misery and obscurity and a place without hope.

John, why do you keep saying at least?

Some say that the effects of this suggested catastrophe extended much further than just the earth.

Some will tell you the entire universe was laid waste.

But then on the other end of the spectrum, some say that the original only meant a small portion of the earth was affected.

Those that hold this belief will contend that God was only referring to the portion of the earth that he would later promise to his people Israel.

Just another controversy we're not going to debate here.

However, I believe it was at least the entire earth that was thrown into complete chaos and not just some portion thereof.

So I will tell you, I do contend with those that think it was it was limited to the land.

It's not.

It was limited to the entire earth at least.

And I believe the language makes that clear.

It was all the way across the whole world.

Now it may be possible, but that the rest of the universe was affected.

Okay.

But I actually believe when sin comes on the scene, it does indeed affect the entire universe.

But we'll talk about that at another time.

So back to our current discussion.

The original Hebrew in verse 2 paints a picture of complete devastation.

Get that in your head.

Complete devastation, the likes of which you and I can't imagine, the likes of which only God can fix.

Only the creator can fix.

Only the one powerful enough to create can fix.

Verse 2 of chapter one, listen to me, is a description of a bleak, dead world.

And that's why it had to be something other than what happened in verse one of chapter one, because God would never create a world that's bleak and dead.

First of all, why would he?

I mean, he can do anything.

Some say that this without form and void was kind of like the primordial soup that God was going to work on.

Why would God add an extra step?

If he's going to create it, just create it.

Why does he need a bowl of soup to stir before he makes the earth?

He doesn't.

Why would he do that?

He has no limits.

Why would he create something that was without form and void before he created a vibrant living world?

Why would he do that?

If you were a sculptor on par with Da Vinci or Rodin, would you spend your energies creating those lumpy pencil cups we all made as Father's Day gifts when we were in the third grade?

Of course not.

Neither would God.

It would be a waste of his talent.

And frankly, with God's power, nothing like that could happen.

You see, God is perfect and without flaw.

Therefore, all he creates comes out perfect.

Now, wait a minute, you might say, what about mankind?

What about Adam?

He's about as imperfect as anything could be.

Well, my answer to that is, thank you for proving my point.

Mankind wasn't created flawed, he became flawed.

Precisely what happened to the original, original perfect creation of the earth.

Therefore, something other than the original creation is described in verse two.

Well, then why didn't God tell us that?

I know you know the answer.

God didn't include the details of whatever desolated the earth because it wasn't important to the story.

All that was important was that there was a dead, lifeless world after he created it vibrant and perfect.

That was the story he wanted to tell.

What happened in between was not important.

And I'm only bringing all this up because science has advanced enough to the point that we are just now starting to discover lots of God's creative secrets, and we can use this to improve our faith in what God has done and what He will do.

For instance, we're beginning to discover just how big this universe is.

Did you know there was a time that scientists thought that the edge of everything was actually quite nearby?

Not that long ago, scientists surmised that with only a modest improvement in technology, one could actually travel to the far end of the universe.

In those days, in fact, all the way up to those days, no one could have ever imagined that there was such a thing as infinity out there.

But over the past couple of centuries or so, we're starting to change our minds about that.

Also, little by little, we're making discoveries that are uncovering how truly wonderful life on this planet really is.

Not just that there's actually life, but that the actual workings and maintenance of life are here.

As I always opine, listen, it's one thing to create a universe, it's a whole nother thing to keep that universe going.

And while I'm on that topic, let me just mention one amazing fact.

Not only does this universe just keep rolling along, but there's not one piece of evidence that it's slowing down.

In fact, quite the opposite.

What's making scientists squirm is the fact that the universe continues to grow.

That's just not something they can get their heads around.

And what's more, not one sign of decay.

In billions of years, not one sign of decay.

And then if anything does decay in the universe, it becomes something else.

You know, it's almost as if we could call this universe everlasting.

It's not eternal.

Only God is eternal.

Well, what's the difference?

Aren't you quibbling?

Eternal means no beginning and no end.

The universe had a beginning.

The Bible tells this, tells us this, and now scientists mostly agree with it.

But as far as we can tell, it doesn't look like it will ever end.

Now that's a little bit overwhelming if you think about it too long, which let's not do because we have other stuff to talk about.

Science is uncovering some incredible facts about the creation.

They've cracked into DNA, and boy, has it been a treasure box.

Now, I'm not sure everyone in the scientific community is as happy as that, with that as others might be, though the negative Nellies have been quite masterful at hiding their disappointment.

You see, to the scientific community, this discovery didn't really pan out like they had hoped.

Unraveling the mysteries of DNA was actually supposed to, once and for all, vindicate all the process that progress that biological science was sure they had already made.

The intelligentsia figured once they mapped out DNA, it would put this God nonsense to bed forever, relegate Genesis to the land of fairy tales once and for all.

The hope was that once DNA was decoded, they figured all the dreams of materialistic science would come true.

DNA would once and for all say that the origin of life didn't begin with God, but rather some series of fortuitous but random events.

Well, as I said, it's not quite worked out that way, has it?

You see, the information DNA is revealing is that actually life has this startling ability to shatter some of these foolish beliefs.

Science likes to call them theories, but they sure treat them like beliefs, religious beliefs, actually.

Anyhow, as we peer closer into the biology of things, the staggering complexity of it all is starting to reveal itself.

Clearly, God does want us to find him through our curiosities about nature.

And no doubt that curiosity, that built-in desire to know more, came from God as well.

He wants to reveal himself to us.

God doesn't want us to be ignorant about him, he wants us to find him in creation, and that's very unique.

Have you ever seen a squirrel with a microscope?

I haven't.

Have you ever seen an eagle, though they have good eyesight?

Have you ever sat seen them sitting on top of a hill looking up in the sky and trying to count the stars?

I haven't.

They don't care.

I believe God is leading us, He's pointing us toward guiding us to these discoveries.

And I am convinced that God is the one who showed us how to decode DNA.

He's guided our discoveries of the amazing nature of life on this planet.

But it's not just biology that's painting us an unexpected picture.

We've also found out through mostly geology that this earth and the universe are actually really old.

Now, God didn't tell us this in his word, but he did tell us this in nature.

So this time it's not science that's being surprised by some of this.

It's those young earthers who insist that everything to know about the earth, the age of the earth, is in the Bible.

They're surprised, but maybe that's written in the record God gave us elsewhere.

There are lots of things that we have been, are, and will be discovering about God, and every time we We find the answers to these little mysteries, like you know, how old the universe is, every time we find the answers to these questions, we get closer and closer to finding out what He wanted us to find out.

And if we're open-minded and not foolish, we'll discover that we serve a mighty, mighty God.

It's been a slow go so far, but once we stop making up myths like evolution, we will be forced to realize that in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.

Now, believe it or not, we still have a lot to talk about in verse two.

So, one more time, verses one and two together.

In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth, and the earth was without form, the earth became without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

Now you'd think, by the way, the way, the way that we read these two verses, that they sort of happen back to back.

And let me say, that's what's led to so much confusion over the age of the earth.

We think that God is saying A happened, and then B happened right after that.

I mean, that's what the English translation makes it look like.

But actually, those statements are not structured that way grammatically in the original.

As a matter of fact, there was an enormous gulf of time between the two.

Now, we've been hinting at this for some time, so it sounds like I'm repeating myself, which I guess I am, but anyhow, so since you're used to it, here it goes again.

The way the original Hebrew is written, we can only come to the conclusion that there must have been a vast chronological space between verses one and two.

By the way, this is what some theologians have called the gap theory.

Have you ever heard of the gap theory?

That's what they are calling this.

The difference between verse one and verse two, there's a big gap there.

This is called the gap theory, the belief that there's a large gap of time between verses one and two.

Now we're talking on a scale of billions of years.

Now it's called the gap theory because it's not a proven fact.

Actually, it'll never be proven, at least not in this dispensation.

Well, why?

Why can't it be proven?

Because God didn't share those details with us.

You see, the amount of time between the creation of the universe and the time that the earth became without form and void is not a part of what God wants to tell us in his book.

He just wants to tell us there was a gap, there was a difference, there was a stark contrast.

Because this portion of God's overall story is only concerned with one thing.

It's concerned with who created the universe.

It's right here.

In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.

That's what this section is all about.

That's the goal of this section.

Who created it?

God did.

God's only goal in writing Genesis 1 is to tell you who created the universe.

That's the who question.

One verse dedicated to the who.

Not complicated.

God created the heaven and the earth.

And then all of the rest of the Bible addresses only one more question about creation.

Why?

We get who first and then why for the rest of the Bible.

The answer to the who question was quick.

The answer to the why question, not so much.

It's going to take some time to unfold.

Now, one more time.

Science does not believe there is a specific reason for anything.

They believe that whatever exists is purely incidental.

No purpose, no goal, no aim.

I don't want to live in a universe like that.

I don't know about you.

Nothing to hope for, nothing to reach for.

That's not what our God says.

Our God said there was a perfect world and then it became damaged somehow, and God is going to fix that.

That's the universe I want to live in.

Again, I find it very difficult to believe that anyone who has actually studied the enormous complexity of everything, actually, but mostly of the earth life forms, I find it very difficult to believe that such a person would conclude that all of this happened unplanned and without intention.

Now I want to go into specifics, but suffice it to say that the way just plant life appears to be designed should tell anyone doing the examination that there has to be a reason there's so much going on here.

The simplest life forms are still very, very complex.

But there are few things more important to the modern believer than establishing the truth and relevance of the book of Genesis.

We're taking our time because we have to make sure we leave nothing to chance.

And I don't want you to think that the Old Testament, and particularly Genesis, is only for cavemen.

Cavemen.

You modern thinking, educated people can get into Genesis even more.

It's fascinating.

And I want you to believe that.

We still have a little bit more to talk about here, but let's pick it up there next time.

We hope this study has blessed you.

God's word is a great treasure, and it's our belief that a thorough, purposeful study of it will bring all of God's children to an understanding of his eternal plan of redemption.

It is our prayer that this will be so for all of our listeners.

Please join us again soon.

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