Disciple Fast Track Into the Word Into the World Genesis-Exodus Study Manual

1God Speaks

OUR HUMAN CONDITION

The world and all that is in it was created for human beings. So I make the most of it, enjoy life, and use everything available to me, even when I may be wasting resources or harming the earth.

ASSIGNMENT

This week you will be opening Torah. Turn through these first five books of the Bible, noticing headings and major themes. Get acquainted with the study aids provided in your Bible.

SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES

Celebration

As we learn to trust God to provide, we begin to see ourselves in proper relationship to God’s total creation, which frees us for obedience experienced as joy.

What would help me live within God’s creation and interact with all parts of creation in a way that I would feel joy?

How will I practice this spiritual discipline this week?

Sabbath

God created the world and then declared Sabbath time, time set apart for rest. God rested; so we rest and celebrate the grandeur and mystery of creation. If you can, go outside and look around. Take the created world in through all your senses and remember you are part of it. You belong to God your Creator. Read Psalm 8.

Prayer

Pray daily before study:

"I will thank you, LORD, with all my heart;

I will talk about all your wonderful acts.

I will celebrate and rejoice in you;

I will sing praises to your name, Most High"

(Psalm 9:1-2).

Prayer concerns for the week:

RESPECT

Day 1Read introductory material in your Study Bible on Torah, Old Testament.

Day 2Read Genesis 1:1–2:3 (a priestly Creation account, Sabbath).

Day 3Read Genesis 2:4-25 (an early, earthy Creation story).

Day 4Read Psalms 104; 145 (praise to the Creator).

Day 5Read Psalm 147 (God cares and provides); Isaiah 40:12-31 (God the Creator).

Day 6Read Into the Word and Into the World and answer the questions or provide responses.

Day 7Rest, pray, and attend class.

INTO THE WORD

We enter, not only the powerful Creation stories nor even just the mighty Book of Genesis. We are opening the pages of Torah, that vast unified narrative that reaches from the first stirrings of creation to that moment when the Hebrew tribes stood on Jordan’s banks, ready to cross over into the land of promise.

The first five books of the Bible have long been seen as a spiritual and literary unit. Sometimes called the Pentateuch—penta meaning five, teuch meaning book or scroll, hence the Five Scrolls—it includes the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. These books are called Torah, a word that is often translated law but is more accurately understood as instruction or teaching. Traditionally Torah has been attributed to Moses, because his law and his powerful personhood stand at its center. Torah provides the foundation for Jewish thought and practice. An ancient rabbi might quote the prophets or the psalms; but if he really wanted to be authoritative, he would quote from Torah, the instruction of Moses. Torah is bedrock, the heartbeat of Judaism, the authority for all that follows. Some Jewish scholars would say that the remainder of the Old Testament and all other written material and all oral tradition are simply elaborations of Torah.

The basic theme of Torah is this: God, the Creator of the world, called the patriarchs and matriarchs to be a blessing to the nations and promised them the land of Canaan. When Israel became enslaved in Egypt and numerous, God freed them from bondage and led them through the wilderness with wonderful demonstrations of grace. God continually taught them how to live as a covenant community. Then after their lengthy wanderings, God gave them, under Joshua, the land of promise.

This theme is not always easy to perceive, because the Bible uses a variety of literary forms. But to the reader whose spiritual eye is open, the mysterious thread of God’s gracious work runs through it all.

Genesis: Creation

Two Creation stories swing wide the door to Torah. The first is a sophisticated, thoughtful, majestic account laced with theological insight. The second is a story—earthy, primitive, playful, hinting at truths yet to be explored. Each interacts with the other to give us a rich creational and caring faith.

The beginning words could be translated as When God began creating the heavens and the earth. The first note struck is God. God was. God spoke. God said . . . and it was done. The universe takes form and the Bible begins when God speaks (see John 1:1-4).

Other cultures told their own creation stories. The Babylonians had a dualism, a power struggle between good and evil. But the Hebrew faith declares that God created everything. God spoke. The power, the authority, is in God’s Word.

NOTES

Later religions and philosophers defined matter as evil, human flesh as corrupt, the physical side of life as sinful. But in Genesis God announced each day that the created order was good. God’s Word called it into being and made it so.

Notice that God made the sun. In Egypt, people worshiped Ra, the sun god. The sun is no god, says Genesis, but is a part of the created order. In Mesopotamia, people worshiped Nanna, the moon god. The moon is no god, says the Bible, but was placed in space by the Word of the Lord. And the stars (Genesis 1:16), those material things that some people believe control their destiny, God’s Word added them to the sky.

Why the detail on plants, fish, and animals? Because pantheism, that is, the notion that God exists in and through the created order, is rejected. The universe is not God; God is the Creator and Sustainer, not simply the life force within. Animism, that primitive religion that sees a god in every tree, every mountain, even the wind, that kind of religion is dismissed by Genesis.

Polytheism, the notion of many gods, is also demolished, for the one holy and almighty God, who was before all time, created everything that is. Even the great sea monsters, so feared by ancient peoples, are mere playthings for God and under God’s control.

A priestly influence shows in 1:14. The sun and moon and stars are created, in part, so that we can know when to celebrate sacred seasons or religious festivals.

What about humankind? God created human beings after the plants and the animals in the created order. They were made in God’s image on the sixth day, given authority, pronounced very good. The term image of God (imago dei), or God’s own image, has caused all thoughtful people to ponder. What does it mean?

Some say that to be in the image of God is to have the ability to decide, to think, to choose. That which separates us from the birds and the animals, the rocks and the trees is the will.

Others suggest that image of God means to be able to relate, to love. That it is not good for human beings to live alone jumps out at us from both Creation stories and becomes a biblical theme. When people are alone, as Jacob or Joseph was alone, they are in trouble.

Another interesting way to explain image of God is to focus not on ourselves but on others. Other people are made in the image of God. Our neighbor reflects the being of the divine. Confronted by you, I am reminded of who God is. Therefore, we should treat other people with respect because they represent the Holy One. My neighbor has intrinsic worth because he or she is the image of God. So I also have intrinsic worth, as well as considerable responsibility, because I too am the image of God.

What is your understanding of the responsibility that comes with bearing the image of God?

NOTES

Careful study will show that the first Creation story should end with Genesis 2:3. The priestly emphasis on Sabbath clearly flows out of the account of the six days of Creation. God acted on the seventh day too; God rested.

Now here is a point pondered across the centuries. What is the climax, the apex of Creation? The creation of humankind or the creation of Sabbath? Which is more important, the image of God to have dominion over the earth, to live in love relationship both with God and with neighbor? Or Sabbath rest that proclaims God as Creator and gives all creatures and creation a time to rest, knowing that everything that exists has its being in the graceful hands of God? What is life without perspective?

What does each of these spiritual truths say to you?

The second Creation story is older, down to earth, whimsical. God seems to start with a piece of dried-up desert. When God acts, life springs forth: Water begins to flow over all of the fertile land (2:6).

The root meaning of the Hebrew word for formed (2:7), sometimes translated molded, may be seen in a potter at a potter’s wheel. The Lord took dirt from the ground—remember the relationship between humankind and earth—functioned as a potter, and then breathed into the clay figure life’s breath. In Hebrew the word is ruach, and in Greek the word is pnuema; both words mean wind, air, breath, and Spirit. The human being came to life (2:7), in common terms, a bundle of needs and desires.

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil (2:9, 17) refers more to experience than to head knowledge. The Hebrew word for good can mean nice, pleasant, beautiful, as well as morally right. The word for evil can mean bad, vicious, wicked, as well as wrong. So to eat from this tree of knowledge would mean to open oneself to knowing a whole range of experiences, some desirable, some distortions of life.

What does this tree symbolize? Boundaries. Always in life boundaries, limits, exist. But the tree attracts our attention in yet another way. Right and wrong, good and evil stand also at the doorway of Scripture. God’s holiness looms large in the strange tree. Human tendency to want more, to think, If only I could get . . . , if only I could have . . . , then I would be happy, is overshadowed. God’s holy boundaries are symbolically perceived in this strange tree.

The word helper (2:20) is most often used of God. God is my helper (Psalm 54:4). In English, helper can mean one who serves or waits on another. But here helper is one who comes to my aid, one who is my strong companion.

NOTES

The man falls into a deep sleep, a trance. Implied is a religious experience, much like Jacob had when he slept at Bethel (Genesis 28:10-22). The rib symbolizes a side by side arrangement, bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh (2:23). That, says the Bible, is why a man leaves father and mother. Woman and man were made to help each other. Naked, but experiencing no guilt, no shame, not afraid—such was the original vision of innocence.

The Testimony of the Universe

Creation is a witness to God. How can anyone ever deny the reality of God, with the mountains, the trees, and particularly the skies giving witness?

"Heaven is declaring [telling about] God’s glory;

the sky is proclaiming [shouting about] his handiwork.

One day gushes the news to the next [like a daily

newspaper],

and one night informs another what needs