July 31, 2024 – Genesis 1:24-27
The Creation of Man.
During the first 5 days of Creation, God establishes order amongst the chaos that was the primordial earth, by investing his Word into material substance and causing recognizable forms to appear. This Creation is God’s Revelation of himself in the forms that He causes to appear during these days. God’s revealed traits are that He is protective of the fragile, confused and lost; clearly separates darkness from light, He is a simple and uncomplicated power, and He is miraculous in not being bound by the dependencies of His created earthly order in order to save the broken. Since His protective and hopeful intentions are infused into the fabric of Creation, this is an act of sacrifice on God’s part, in that it requires that He lowers or empties his divinity for our sake.
The entry of sin to the created order is after God’s creation and runs counter to His will. However, we still perceive God’s goodness through this admixture of sin. This perception is driven by the hope of all Creation for unity with God and the embrace of His love, but is sometimes confused by our impulsive misperception of ourselves as God. Confused by this misperception, we are often disappointed, hopeless and thereby susceptible to despair. This is when Satan begins his evil work.
On the sixth day of Creation, God prepares the way for man’s appearance by providing an abundance of land animals, presented in the order in which they will be useful to man’s dominion. God’s creative activities on the sixth day, echo the Creation of abundant life forms in the seas and in the air on the third day, and provide the foundation for man’s civilized order in later centuries.
At the Creation of man, the narrator’s voice changes reference to “Let us make man in our image”. This plural reference is a clear foretelling of the Trinitarian nature of God, and is appropriate in the context of the Creation of man in God’s image. It implies that man will reign over other created beings in similarity to God’s reign over all Creation and man himself. Man’s identity is created so as to be in relation to God, and man’s dual nature as material flesh and God-like faculties of reason, creation, imagination and love is a clear illustration of God’s sacrificial love emptied into the earthly vessel of man’s flesh. The personal and intimate link between man’s identity and God, are often obscured by our sinful distractions, and need regular refreshment by regularly and consciously turning towards God during our time on the earth. Our motivations are always in tension between divine grace and sinfulness; our choices determine whether we move closer to God, or condemn ourselves to Hell. Fortunately, God has provided well-ordered structure in Creation to support our choices against sinfulness. Male and female were created as complementary beings who need each other’s support to rule Creation in accord with God’s will. The earthly manifestation of God’s love is generated, shared and continues to grow in a well-ordered relationship between male and female. This love is available as a radiant example to others for emulation and the generation of peace in society.
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