Interestingly enough, more people have become news junkies in the last few months than ever before—watching the headlines everyday and wondering, “What is going to happen next?” And that’s the real stressor about the situation we’re in—isn’t it—the uncertainty of what’s going to happen tomorrow. That’s the hardest thing for most people to deal with. They’re facing an unknown future which they can’t predict—and certainly cannot control.
So, today and really for the next several months I thought it might be a good idea for us to look at a Book in the Bible that was designed by God to help us deal with stress and especially stress overload caused by the fear of an unknown future. And it may surprise you to know that this Book is the Book of Genesis.
The reason this surprises us is because when most of us think of Genesis all we think of is a long book filled with ancient history, endless genealogies, names we can’t pronounce, stories we’ve heard over and over again in Sunday school, and all the sometimes confusing and technical details about Creation versus Evolution. And quite honestly, that’s why Genesis is one of the least preached Books in the Bible. That’s really too bad because as I said before—Genesis should be a go-to book for God’s people when they’re dealing with stress . . . especially the stress that comes from facing an unknown future.
Now, why do I say that Genesis was written for people who are stressed out? Because, the original audience God gave Genesis to—were the Hebrew people Moses had just led out of Egypt into the middle of the barren, uninhabitable, dark and dangerous, “no-mans” land of the Sinai Wilderness. These were people who had been in Egypt for 430 years—most of that time as slaves—who had all but given up on God ever hearing their cries.
Then God, whom they had for the most part forgotten—raised up Moses, an adopted former member of Egypt’s royal family turned fugitive whom the Hebrews did not know—to lead them out of Egypt on a journey through the Red Sea—and then across a dry, desolate, and dangerous wilderness they were totally unfamiliar with on their way to a homeland—a “promised land” which they had never seen and wondered if it really even existed. Talk about stress!
Can you imagine all the “what-if’s” these people were thinking about when it came to this “new normal” they were thrust into?! So, if you were there would it be of interest to you to meet this God and find out a little bit more about Him? Might you want to know something about His ability to take care of you, provide for your family’s needs, keep you safe, and successfully lead you all to the Promised Land?
Well, I sure would!! I mean, if I am going to entrust my life, my family, my future, and in fact, my very soul to this God—I’d like to get the scoop on Him. In fact, if I don’t get the scoop on Him—if I really don’t have any understanding of this God—how can I really trust Him—let alone love Him.
So, the way in which God began to alleviate their stress and their fear was by formally introducing Himself to them through the very first Book in the Bible—the Book we call Genesis—which God called Moses to record while leading the Hebrews through their wilderness experience. But, not only did God introduce Himself and make Himself known to His people—He also introduced them to themselves and by extension—us to ourselves by sharing through Genesis the stories of our roots and our ancestors. You see, in Genesis, we find out who we are, why we’re here, Who made us, and believe it or not—why we’re having to deal with this Coronavirus.
But, that’s not the only reason God gave them and us—Genesis. You see, Genesis tells us why there is evil in the world and how it got into us and why life just doesn’t seem to make sense so much of the time. . . .and why our hearts experience so much emptiness. Genesis tells us why we can’t seem to be content or get along or stop striving for more and what God has done, is doing, and will do about all this evil in and outside of us. And in Genesis, we also get a glimpse of our future and how God restores our relationship with Him as well as our hopes, dreams, and original destiny through the “seed of the woman” Who would come to earth to defeat evil and death by giving up His life. Genesis also gives us the preview and outline for the rest of the Bible. Its the first chapter of God’s story about His intention to live life with His people on earth so as to fill the earth with His glory. And the story ends in Revelation 21-22 with God doing exactly that! So, God gives His stressed out and fearful people Genesis to give us faith, hope and courage by revealing Himself, His Attributes, His Faithfulness, His Promises, His Love, and His Son to us.
But, to really get a handle on Genesis we need to understand that the Hebrews were not so much concerned with how old the earth was or precisely how God created the universe as much as they were with knowing if this God Who was leading them into the unknown—could and would take care of them so as to give them a future in the promised land.
Now, don’t misunderstand me—I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be concerned with the age of the earth or how God created the universe. What I am saying is that if all you see Genesis and especially the first two chapters in Genesis as is a textbook refuting evolution—you will have missed the whole point of the Book.
You see, God gave the Hebrews and us Genesis so that we might know Him better than we do—so that we will trust Him much more than we are—so that we will love and enjoy Him far more than we ever thought—as He leads us safely home to the promised land—that their promised land was merely a picture of. But . . . on top of all this and in fact, most important of all . . . God gave His people Genesis to introduce us to Christ and the gospel.
Yes, you heard me right. You see, its really important to know that Genesis, correctly understood, is primarily about Jesus Christ and the Gospel. I mean, Jesus, Himself makes this point in several passages like Luke 24:25-32, 44-47; John 1:45; 5:39, 45-47. The apostle Paul makes this same point in Acts 26:22-23 and 28:23.
You see, Jesus is the ultimate reality that everything in the Old Testament including Genesis is talking abut and pointing to. Jesus makes this clear in Matthew 5:17-18 when He said He came to complete and fulfill the Old Testament. You see, Jesus and His sacrifice on the cross are what of the Old Testament Scriptures, the feasts, the sacrificial system, the Temple, the priesthood, and all the stories pointed to.
Thus, every bit of Scripture including Genesis is part of the same great story of God rescuing us from our sin and its condemnation through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ so that we might be reconciled to God and restored to our original destiny in Creation, which we had all but forgotten. As Tim Keller writes:
There are two ways to read the Bible. The one way is to read it as though its all about you—what you have to do in order to be right with God and stay right with God. This way of reading the Bible will never give you sure hope and security because you will never measure up. The other way to read it is to see it as all about Jesus. Its about Who Jesus is and what Jesus has done to make you absolutely right with God. If you do not read the Bible this way you will never be secure in your Faith. But, once you understand that the Bible is all about Jesus Christ and what He has done for you and in your place—then you can be secure and experience hope and peace.
And this is precisely why Genesis is so important to us—It introduces us to the God of all hope, to God the Son—Jesus—and to God the Holy Spirit who all show up in the very first verses of chapter one. In fact, in Genesis we have the foundation for all the major fundamental teachings of the Bible. But again, most important, in Genesis we have the first mentioning, explanation, and pictures of the Gospel of Jesus Christ which is why I am calling this series—“The Gospel According To Genesis”.
Now, the title “Genesis”, which means “origins”, comes from the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures which is called the Septuagint. The original Hebrew title of the Book is simply “Beginning”. Both are appropriate titles because Genesis is about the origin or the beginning of our universe, the beginning of marriage, family, sin, redemption, the Hebrew people, and a bunch of other things.
But, Genesis is also especially concerned with informing us about Him, Who has no beginning . . . Him, Who has always been and always will be. Him, Whom we call God. Him, whom we, who are believers, call our Father. And we need to keep in mind that before God became the Creator, He was a Father. We see this in Jesus’ words in John 17:24 where Jesus says: “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory, the very glory you have given me, because you loved me before the creation of the world.”
You see, in eternity past, eons before God initiated the creation of the heavens, the earth, and us—God the Creator was God the Father. In fact, His role and position within the Trinity has always been for all of eternity as God the Father just as God the Son has always been the eternal Son of God—completely equal to the Father as God. So, God didn’t create to become a father. He created because He was a Father. As Michael Reeves writes in his book entitled, Delighting In The Trinity,
The fact that Jesus is “the Son” really says it all. Being a Son means he has a Father. . . . That is who God has revealed himself to be: not first and foremost Creator or Ruler, but Father. . . . He is Father. All the way down. Thus all that he does, he does as Father. That is who he is. He creates as a Father and he rules as a Father.
And He created so that He might share the love He has for His Son and the joy He has in His Son with people who will believe in and love His Son. And if you believe in Jesus and you love Jesus—it is because God, the Father has set His love on you. This means that if you love Jesus for Who He really is—Whom the Bible presents Him to be—then you are loved, cherished, treasured, fully accepted, and highly valued by God the Creator of Heaven and Earth Who is Your Father.
Jesus put it this way in John 16:27, “The Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God”.
And if you have God the Creator as your personal Heavenly Father, through faith in his Son, Jesus Christ, then you have a truly good, powerful, patient, wise, attentive, and forgiving Father whose love for you is greater than you can ever imagine. The problem with all this however is that, as Reeves goes on to say:
Many of us simply have no idea how to have a Father in heaven. We know to pray, “Our Father who art in heaven. . . .” but we still pray (and feel) as if he’s galaxies away. We know God is sovereign, righteous, all-wise, just, and even merciful, but we struggle to believe he could be that personal — like a father would be to his own child. Some of us are uncomfortable in prayer not because we haven’t learned enough about prayer, but because we’ve never learned what it means to truly be a child of God.
And this is why we need to study Genesis—so that we can learn what it means to truly be a child of our Heavenly Father—Who loved us so much that He sent Jesus to the cross to die in our place to pay for our sins that we might be reconciled to our Father in Heaven.
Genesis is the beginning of our Heavenly Father’s story in which He shares with us Who He is, Who we are, Why He created us, What broke our relationship with Him, and What He has done and is doing to bring us back home to Him. Thus, Genesis is a Book about the future as much as it is the past and it presents a great future for people who will come home to their Father. And that is the only real antidote and cure for stress there is!
[From the sermon series The Gospel According To Genesis, Sermon 1, Pastor Mark Waite]
