People will often say to me that they tried to read the Bible but didn't get very far. This is totally understandable. It would be arrogant to think it is not. The writers didn't write for you or me. They were writing for people of their time. Yet, interestingly, what they said continues to ring true.
Really? Yes, and in fact that should not be very surprising. We often see this phenomenon in the history of writing. For example, Shakespeare wrote for the audiences of his time. Yet many still find truth in his words.
Yet, far be it from me to at this point to tell you to read the entire Bible. I won't ask for that much today. I will be thrilled if you, esteemed reader, for the first time, read just the first page. Genesis, chapter one. As they say, Is that too much to ask?
This is the chapter that speaks about the world being created in seven days. Therefore whenever people outside of Christian churches refer to it, they typically dismiss it. After all, no one except deluded fundamentalists takes this sort of creation mythology seriously, they confidently tell us. Believers look down at their shoes and hope not to make eye contact.
The first chapter of the Bible, though should be taken seriously as the starting point for life, yours and mine. If it is not we expose ourselves to peril.
Take the opening line. It is magisterial. In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth. Think of these ten words as an announcement accompanied by thunderous fanfare – horns, other brass instruments, and percussion by the Toronto Symphony and Neil Ellwood Peart.
This opening line firmly places God at the foundation of the world. Behold! The creator of this incredible stage, the designer of all the sets. And, although not the writer of every part of the script – as Sir Michael Philip Mick Jagger once sang, Satan too has opportunity to throw in his bits, as do you and I – God is nonetheless the creator of mind, speech, and every being, which in turn, beget more beings.
Next line. The opening scene. It's a storm on the high seas. Shape-shifting cold, dark, watery chaos. Hurricane Sandy. No place for living things. But the Spirit of God is there, hovering over the uninviting dark. Ready to energize and give order.
And then, scene two, God speaks, like an ancient middle eastern king to his court. "Let there be. . . ."
Order replaces the chaos. Day and night. Sky and water. Land with vegetation. And then items to fill those places. Stars, moon, and sun. Fish and birds. All kinds of animals. And finally, as the pinnacle, humans.
And to humans God says, "It's all yours! This is your home. Fill it with your tent dwelling tribes, nations, libraries, colleges, concerts, machines, and stories. Make your home even more blessed and beautiful than I have made it. Create with me. Give order to it as I have given order to it. Celebrate with me."
At our peril we forget that only God is God. Without faith in God, we place our faith elsewhere, anywhere. Where atheism grows, religion thrives.
Without God we overplay the appropriate remembrance of the war dead and make a religion of the sacrifices of veterans. Without God we over-invest in ideology, placing our faith in capitalism, socialism, Nazism, revolution, the American Way, and the Canadian Way. Good luck with that. Or we overemphasize the importance of body building, individual rights, the stock market, real estate, hockey, the latest celebrity on offer, or just about anything else that moves us.
At our peril we forget why we exist. We exist to enjoy the blessings God placed on the whole human race; we exist to make our planet more and more a paradise, not an exhausted, depleted shell of its former self – which is where our present trajectory will bring us; we exist to enjoy the diverse cultures we are able to bring to life; we exist to live without fear and terror, and to live free from tyrannies of all kinds, including the tyranny of bullies who become politicians and the tyranny of modern economists who claim that they are the way, the truth, and the life.
Yes, we have messed up, as page two or three of Genesis teaches. Messed up from the beginning, all of us involved in the destruction. But that doesn't negate the other stuff, the prior things, the first things. In fact, they will never be negated. Jesus Christ was born, died, and was raised from the dead to bring them back "with a vengeance." But that’s another story, though one that can only be understood in the light of the Bible's page one.
